Six Chief Ministers in 10 years have ruled the helm in the State of Maharashtra.

The present
incumbent, Prithviraj Chavan, was selected as the new Chief Minister after Ashok Chavan was
forced to step down in the light of the Adarsh Society scam.

What is the Adarsh Society Scam?

The Adarsh Housing Society scam revolves around a single building named Adarsh Housing
Society located in Colaba, a posh area of Mumbai, Maharashtra

It all started in 1999, when a large plot (over 6,000 sq.ft) in the military complex in Colaba was
released for residential use. The very first proposal of the Adarsh Housing Society came up
before the then Shiv Sena-BJP government with Narayan Rane as the Chief Minister. A second
application came up the following year, this time with the Congress Govt. in power and Vilasrao
Deshmukh as Chief Minister. At this time, the allotment application was sought in the name of
providing homes for war widows and veterans. Eventually, though, a majority of the flats were
allotted to politicians and bureaucrats as well as some Army and Navy Commanders. On the list
of beneficiaries who got flats were Ashok Chavan's relatives, including his mother-in-law (who
passed away in July this year). Now it so happened that Ashok Chavan was heading the Mumbai
Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), which is the official authority
dealing with developments in he Colaba-Nariman Point area of the city. In September that year,
the MMRDA had given the occupation certificate to Adarsh Housing Society.

Other than who should have and who should not have got flats in Adarsh, the tail of the scam
grew longer with more irregularities related to it being discovered.

Here's what was found:

* The Adarsh building was to have 7 storeys. However, in 2005, when Vilasrao Deshmukh was
CM, massive changes were made. Adarsh was granted additional floor space index (this governs
the height of a building) of an adjacent plot that had been reserved for a bus depot. Thus, the
building could increase its height with more floors, the height increasing from less than 30mt to
104 mt.

* The Adarsh building flouted environmental laws. It was important for Adarsh Housing Society
to get clearance from various official environmental authorities before even a brick was laid, as
the building lies in the Coastal Regulatory Zone (meaning all construction projects are regulated
to prevent environmental damage). It was found that both the Union Ministry of Environment
and Forests and the Maharashtra Coastal Zone Management Authority were in the dark
about who exactly gave clearance to the 31-storeyed building – only 6 storeys were considered
legal.
What happened next: In October, Ashok Chavan said he would revoke the occupation
certificate and offered his resignation as CM to Congress Chief Sonia Gandhi. Now the fate of
the Adarsh Housing Society, which spend nearly 26 crores on the land and other costs, is in the
hands of the Union Environment Ministry. They will decide whether to demolish the additional
illegal floors or whether to regularize the whole project as it is and allot the flats to those who
were supposed to get them in the first place – the war veterans and widows. So it is those
Ministry officials who will finally answer the query about what will happen to the Adarsh
Housing Society tenants.

Whatever happens, one thing is clear: the pen is definitely mightier than the sword! It was the
Hindustan Times reports of the Adarsh Housing Society scam which set off the train of
investigations.

So anybody who wants to start constructions had better get all their documents and no-objection
certificates in order before they break the traditional coconut to lay the foundation
stone...otherwise it will be raining coconuts on their own heads!