The court also sought to know if any rent is being paid to the state by the BJP for the structure.

The Bombay high court on Wednesday, while hearing a bunch of petitions seeking action against “illegal” structures constructed by political parties in Nehru Garden at Nariman Point in South Mumbai, directed the BMC and BJP to inform it on the next date of hearing if they were ready to bring down the illegal portion of the office. The court also sought to know if any rent is being paid to the state by the BJP for the structure.

The division bench of Justice A.S. Oka and Justice C.V. Bhadang issued these directions while hearing a PIL filed by ‘Nariman Point Churchgate Citizen Welfare Trust’ seeking action against “illegal” structures constructed by political parties and other government departments.

During hearing Advocate General (AG) Shrihari Aney, on behalf of the state government, told the court that the stand of the state is clear that anything that is illegal should go; however, he also said that the claim of petitioner was incorrect because the government had allotted the land to these parties for setting up the structure. He also said that no building plan regarding the plot “to justify the structures” was available.

In the meantime, the petitioner’s lawyer showed photographs of structures to the court and said that the land was allotted to set up a temporary structure but it is clear that the office (of the BJP) is not a temporary but ground-plus-one structure. He also pointed out that initially land admeasuring 1,482 square feet was allotted and later 1,200 square feet more was allocated; but now, as per the petitioner, the ground floor occupies around 9,700 sq ft.

Advocate S.U. Kamdar on behalf of the BJP told the court that the size mentioned by the petitioner was wrong.