The Hindu : New Delhi News : Forgotten Act comes to the rescue

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jan 09, 2006

New Delhi

New Delhi

Forgotten Act comes to the rescue

Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar

Society flat owners holding General Power of Attorney denied voting rights in RWAs

NEW DELHI: For lakhs of people living in over 5,000 cooperative group housing societies (CGHS) across Delhi and who had been thus far been deprived of voting rights in the residents association since they were General Power of Attorney (GPA) holders, an old forgotten Act has come as a power tool. And now these residents are seeking implementation of the Delhi Apartment Ownership Act, 1986, which was passed by Parliament, that had come into existence with its notification in 1987 and confers full ownership rights on allottees as well as transferees of such CGHS apartments.

To mobilise mass support on the issue, some residents have also formed Delhi Residents' Front which would now expose how the authorities had dumped the Act, which could have democratised the management of housing complexes.

The president and convener of the Front, Sanjiv Kumar, said while the majority of flats in group housing complexes had been transferred by their original allottees, the status and rights of transferees had not been recognised by the existing law -- Delhi Cooperative Societies Act 2003 -- which had discriminated between residents by giving more powers and status to one section known as original allottees while relegating the GPAs as second class citizens without any voting rights.

In the name of giving status and rights i.e. membership and voting rights to transferees (GPA's), its provisions had sought to extract high revenues from them, engross them in bureaucratic hurdles, leave plenty of scope for corrupt practices for the people in power and office of Registrar of Cooperative Societies, Mr Kumar said.

But now that the both original allottees and GPA's have found a way, Mr Kumar the "Democratisation of Cooperative Group Housing Societies" movement has been started. Stating that it is a pity that the Government has not taken any measures to implement the DAO Act, the Front has appealed to all apartment owners to come forward and form Apartment Owners' Association in their CGHS complex as per the Act and give momentum to the process of democratization of CGHS complexes.

Mr Kumar said the provisions of DCS Act would give way to the provisions of DAO Act in case of any conflict or repugnancy, in accordance with Article 256 of the Constitution of India, and the DAO Act confers full ownership rights upon allottees and their transferees on power of attorney and thus makes the apartment fully inheritable and transferable. Further, it also confers the rights and powers of management and administration of the housing complexes upon such apartment owners.

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