While the trustees claim they were compelled to demolish the historic structure because of a BMC notice, the buildings department had actually only recommended repairs
Faced with the wrath of the entire Dalit community after the overnight demolition of Ambedkar Bhavan, the culprits have so far defended their actions by claiming that the historic building was severely dilapidated and that the BMC had ordered them to raze it.
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Ambedkar Bhavan was demolished in the dead of the night on June 26, sending shockwaves through the Dalit community, particularly Dr BR Ambedkar’s grandsons Prakash and Anandraj. File pics
Upon a little digging, however, mid-day found that the civic body’s Building Proposal department had not even found demolition necessary and had merely suggested repairs instead.
Prakash Ambedkar
As recently as April, the BP department had issued a report stating that the Bhavan need not be demolished. What’s more, the report also slammed the People’s Improvement Trust for misusing the building for commercial purposes like weddings parties.
The procedure
For a private structure to be declared dilapidated, the first step is to get a structural audit done. The Trust therefore employed M/s Structwel Designers & Consultants Pvt Ltd for the job and, in March, the auditor concluded that the building needed to be demolished. The reasons given for this conclusion were that repairs would require a lot of money and even then, they would provide relief only for a few years.
But officials from BMC’s Building Proposal department had a different opinion when they surveyed the property.
In a report dated April 27, the officials stated: “It is also noticed that the stilted portion, open spaces and terraces are being unauthorisedly misused for commercial purposes such as wedding functions, etc, resulting in assembly of people on terrace, thereby increasing the load on the structure. It is therefore felt that the structure may be brought to structurally safer proportions by discontinuing the misuse stated above and by some structural repairs in the east wing.”
Since the BP department was not in favour of demolition, it suggested a second opinion. Another structural engineer was assigned, who once again declared the building as ‘C1’ (extremely dilapidated) and, therefore, unsafe. The department then allowed the ward office to take a decision. On May 31, the ward issued a notice to the Trust under Section 354 of the MMC Act, ordering it to demolish the building.
“Both the structural auditors’ findings were similar. If they were contradictory, the matter would have gone to the Technical Advisory Committee. But since that did not happen, as per rules, we allowed the demolition,” said executive engineer, F/South ward, Parmar.
Redevelopment
The Trust wants to redevelop the structure and it is rumoured that the new building will be 17 storeys high. But in April, the Trust had got permission for only a g+2 structure; the rest of the consumable FSI is yet to be calculated. Once that is done, the trust will have to apply for the extra FSI, take permissions from the BP department and construct additional floors. This procedure can take a long time. Plans of redevelopment had already fizzled out twice in the past, for reasons unknown.
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