[Breaking] Bombay High Court Dismisses Sonu Sood's Plea For Interim Relief Against BMC's Demolition Notice

The Bombay High Court on Thursday dismissed a petition filed by Bollywood actor Sonu Sood seeking interim relief against an unauthorized construction notice issued to him by the local civic body (BMC), in Mumbai. His plea was earlier rejected by the City Civil Court, last month.A single bench of Justice Prithviraj Chavan dismissed the petition, granting no relief to the actor. The notice was issued in October, 2020 under section 53 of the Maharashtra Regional Town Planning Act, with regard to alterations made to a six- storey residential building, in Juhu. The BMC claimed that Sood was a "habitual offender," who was repeatedly trying to convert a residential building into a hotel. While the actor has had significant roles to play in several films like Singh is King and Dabang, he shot to fame during the nationwide lockdown announced due to the Covid pandemic when he arranged for buses to take poor migrant workers back from cities, to their villages. In his petition before the High Court, Sood claimed he had not carried out any illegal construction in the building named "Shakti Sagar." "The petitioner (Sood) has not made any changes in the building that warrants permission from the BMC. Only those changes that are allowed under the Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning (MRTP) Act have been done," advocate Amogh Singh, representing Sood had argued. Through the petition Sood had sought to quash the notice and to grant interim relief by not taking any 'coercive' action against him. He was granted interim relief. In their affidavit before the high Court, the BMC represented by senior counsel Anil Sakhare stated that Sood was a "habitual offender" who wants to "enjoy the commercial proceeds of unauthorised work and therefore once again started re-constructing the demolished portion in order to make it operational as a hotel albeit illegally and without permission from the License department," the civic body said in the affidavit. The BMC contended that the building was constructed and modified contrary to the building plan. Moreover, neither Sood nor his wife Sonali had documents indicate they are the owners of the building, the civic body said. "The appellant, who has totally modified an entire building unauthorizedly into a hotel, is running the same without a license," the BMC municipal corporation said. The BMC claimed action was first initiated against Sood in September 2018, with demolition of unauthorized work being carried out two months later, in November. The BMC said Sood had the "audacity" to start the unauthorized work again, for which the civic body undertook another demolition drive.

[Breaking] Bombay High Court Dismisses Sonu Sood's Plea For Interim Relief Against BMC's Demolition Notice

Sharmeen Hakim

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