The Supreme Court of India has ordered a stay on the continued construction of Hiranandani Group’s Rs 12,000 crore power project near Pune. The construction power house is creating a 2,500 MW gas-based power plant at Navlakh Umbre village in Maval taluka on the outskirts of Pune, however allegedly only gained permission for a 355 MW construction.
After being notified of a petition which alleged that due process was not followed when gaining an environmental clearance certificate for the project. The Supreme Court stated that the clearance was awarded “in compliance with the peremptory direction of the Bombay High Court”.
The State Environment Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) had witnessed that the Hindustan Electricity Generation Co. Pvt. Ltd., which is a Hiranandani-group subsidiary, had began work on a large-scale activity at the project site before gaining official clearance by the agency and requested from the company a written assurance that such blatant violations would not be repeated.
In February, Hindustan Electricity Generation Co. Pvt. Ltd. filed a writ petition at the High Court against the SEIAA’s demand on the grounds that it already possessed clearance before work began and had committed no offence. The High Court then asked the company’s representatives to provide a letter claiming that it had not committed any violation and directed the SEIAA to give the clearance certificate to the company.
A petition was filed by Sultan Singh on behalf of the sangh, also referred to a central government notification under the Environment (Protection) Act which states environmental authorities are only entitled to give clearance to Power Projects under 500 MW. For projects above 500 MW, such as the 2,500 MW project currently being built, the company would need clearance directly from the central environmental ministry. This would prevent any work from being undertaken at the project site without securing an environmental clearance from the relevant authority.
The Sangh in its petition said that "The error on the part of the high court and the faulty clearance granted thereon by the SEIAA becomes more palpable in light of the fact that various social and environmental concerns of the petitioner and other residents of the affected villages as well as various procedural and legal objections in the processing of the company's request were given a go by by the authority while adjudicating the same.”
Tuesday, 3 April 2012
Monday, 26 March 2012
Hiranandani can’t construct on plot before making affordable homes - DNA, Pg 1, Mumbai
In a major setback to Hiranandani developers, the Bombay high court (HC) restrained them from carrying out any further development at their Powai township before constructing affordable homes as contemplated under the tripartite agreement between the developer, state government and the MMRDA.
The court observed that they were issuing directives for corrective steps instead of punitive action against the developer and government officials. The HC, however granted liberty to petitioners “to take up the issue of corruption in a criminal prosecution against any errant public officers and the developer.”
A division bench of chief justice Mohit Shah and justice Roshan Dalvi directed the petitioners, Hiranandani developers and MMRDA metropolitan commissioner, to prepare a statement of buildings and structures put up by Hiranandani in Powai Area Development Scheme (ADS) along with the names, description and number of area and units/flats therein within four weeks.
Tuesday, 6 March 2012
Thursday, 1 March 2012
State must take over Hiranandani land
Source: http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-12-23/mumbai/30550594_1_hiranandani-land-owners-low-cost-housing-project
Petitioners, led by activist Medha Patkar, have urged the HC to order the state to take over Hiranandani's land in Powai, even as the developer has offered to submit a bank guarantee of Rs 27 crore. A division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice Roshan Dalvi reserved its judgment on PILs filed by the activists accusing Hrianandani of turning its Powai land (meant for a low-cost housing project) into an upmarket housing scheme.
"The state should take over the Hiranandani land," said advocate Ashish Mehta, counsel for Patkar. "The houses under construction should be acquired by the state. The remaining land should be handed over to Mhada to construct low-cost houses."
Mehta pointed out statistics furnished by the BMC that the total permissible construction rights in the form of floor space index was over 5.24 lakh sq m, including the setback land and development plan road. "As per the agreement, 15% of this space (78,600 sq m) should have been given to the government," said the advocate.According to Mehta, so far Hiranandani has only built 234 flats or around 5,500 sq m and offered to hand over another 26,000 sq m. "This is nowhere close to what is due to the state. Hiranandani has denied flouting rules and has pointed to the arbitrator appointed to look into the tripartite agreement between the land owners, government and MMRDA which has found no irregularities. They said the original agreement was signed in 1986 and the petitioners have approached the court after over 20 years. Earlier, Hiranandani had offered to build 225 flats admeasuring 40 sq m each and 225 flats of 80 sq m each.
Wednesday, 29 February 2012
Monday, 12 December 2011
Interim bail handed to Niranjan Hiranandani
Anticipatory bail was handed to Niranjan Hiranandani after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had issued a look-out notice to both him and his brother Surendra, both of whom are directors at the Hiranandani Group.
“The CBI had on Tuesday issued look-out notices to all airports in the country against Niranjan and brother Surendra, another director of the group.”
Niranjan was forbidden from leaving the country and was required to attend the CBI office as and when called for questioning. He was said to have been abroad on a business meeting when informed of the news and was required to fly back to Mumbai immediately.
Monday, 5 December 2011
How the Hiranandani brothers found themselves under CBI investigation
The trail of the infamous Hiranandani Constructions provident fund scam case dates back to an investigation into illegal assets back in 2007 in which the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) raided the houses of two provident fund commissioners. However, during this investigation, they happened to stumble upon papers relating to the Employee Provident Fund (EPF) of Hiranadani builders.
“The CBI said that they started putting together all the information about the Hiranandani firm and their contractors to see whether they were paying EPF to their employees. “
It was found that fraudulent documents had been produced by the Hiranadani brothers, including false wage records of building site workers.
“Niranjan and Surendra had conspired with EPF officials and prepared bogus details of PF contributions. Such contributions were never made and the Hiranandani Group was allowed to get undue benefit.”
The CBI made a record by filing the longest charge sheet until this day: 45,373 pages.
The CBI made a record by filing the longest charge sheet until this day: 45,373 pages.
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