Important News: Maintenance according to the area of the flat; Decision of the Co-operative Court
Pune: The co-operative court has ruled that maintenance charges should be levied according to the area of the flats in the apartment. This result has brought relief to the flat owners who have less area in the apartment. This result relates only to the apartment and has nothing to do with the maintenance charges of the society.
The state government has amended the apartment law to allow apartment owners to seek redressal from the department of co-operation. After the decision was taken in July 2020, residents of ‘Treasure Park’ Neelam Patil, Pramod Garad, Atul Itkarkar, Pravin Bhalerao and Narendra Chaudhary sought the approval of Deputy Registrar of Co-operation Digvijay Rathore on the issue. On this, Rathore ruled that in July 2021, the maintenance should be levied on the apartment owners according to the percentage of the undivided share drawn according to the area of the apartment. Three or four BHK flat owners in ‘Treasure Park’ have appealed against this decision at Co-operative Court No. 2 in Pune. The court, after hearing both sides, upheld the decision of the Deputy Registrar. As per Section 10 of the Apartment Act, it has been decided to charge the apartment owners according to the area of the flat.
Neelam Patil, a resident of Treasure Park, said, “This result has brought relief to more than 50,000 apartment owners in the state and around 10,000 apartment owners in Pune. The presidents and secretaries of several apartments, by imposing rules of society, charged equal maintenance to all. This result has shocked the concerned. The decision was not being implemented after Deputy Registrar Rathore had given the verdict regarding ‘Treasure Park’. Maintenance was being taken from small area tenants like high area tenants. The co-operative court’s decision has come as a relief to the flat owners who have less area in the apartment.
Vijay Shinde, former chairman of the Board of Education, and Anil Sawant, former mayor of Wai, were involved in the case. During the hearing, Patil himself appeared in court for an hour. On behalf of Itkarkar, Adv. Aditya Kanitkar, while Adv. Hinge moved the side.
