The Congress will hold a protest march against the proposed amendments in the Rent Control aAt by the state government on January 31. Congress leader Milind Deora, Gurudas Kamat, Mumbai president Sanjay Nirupam have opposed the amendment and written to the chief minister asking him not to go ahead with it.
Mr Nirupam, who has initiated the protest march, has demanded to that all changes to the Maharashtra Rent Control Act, 1999 be dropped and not to discriminate between tenants. “Our demand to the state is to withdraw the Draft Model Tenancy Act, 2015, introduced by the Government of India. This Act seeks to abolish Rent Control and displace crores of residential and commercial tenants in Maharashtra. Also the government should appoint a team of eminent lawyers in consultation with tenant groups to represent the government in the rent act matter in the Supreme Court, which is to be heard by a bench of nine judges,” Mr Nirupam said. The Congress leader also added to introduce a scheme, which enables all tenants to become owners of their premises, he added.
“We conducted a meeting of various organisations today and decided to hold the protest. The state government is trying to impose the amendments and asking its own MLAs to oppose it to give them credit later. But we will not allow it to happen,” Mr Deora said.
Meanwhile, NCP Mumbai president Sachin Ahir also threatened to protest against the amendment. “This is a conspiracy by the state government to increase rent in the guise of Draft Model Tenancy Act, 2015 by the Centre. But we will not allow it to pass the amendment in the legislature. This is going to affect 2 lakh tenants in the city. Some of them might get displaced with sudden increase in the rent. We will not allow it to happen,” Mr Ahir told reporters.
