U-turn on Rent Act: Housing Minister says there was no amendment plan!

Two weeks after he was quoted widely in the media as saying the government is amending the Rent Control Act spreading panic among nearly 3 lakh people who feared that they will be forced to pay higher rents Housing Minister Prakash Mehta yesterday backtracked saying there was no such planThe announcement comes after middayrsquos highimpact coverage where all political parties rallied to voice their opposition and residents spoke out about how they would be affectedThe decision is also the eighth instance when someone from the government has mooted a proposal and the chief minister had to step in to scrap it or order a reviewHousing Minister Prakash MehtaThe government announcement on the rent Act interestingly came via the BJP with the party claiming that there is no such proposal of amending the Act The housing minister who was quiet all this while on Thursday claimed that there was no such proposalRead StoryThe Rent Act could spell doom to these old Mumbai establishmentsAt Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority MHADA on Thursday Prakash Mehta told reporters ldquoThere is no question of amending the Rent Control Act and there was no such proposal by the state government in the context The suggestion to amend the Rent Control Act was present in the draft housing policy in which we had made clear at that time June 2015 that amending the Rent Control Act is not a viable option for the staterdquoOn the Centrersquos policy Mehta said ldquoWe have made it clear to the Centre that adopting its Model Tenancy Act with the state Rent Control Act will not be possible in a city like Mumbai considering the geographical and demographic housing developmentrdquoAmendment or rumourViren Shah head of Federation of Retail Traders Welfare Association had claimed that he had gathered from newspapers that the government was going to amend the rent Act and said that on January 24 Mangal Prabhat Lodha had said that it was a serious issue as there was a proposal However on this Lodha BJP MLA from Malabar Hill said ldquoI donrsquot lie There was a proposal by the central government and it was brought in last June and the state government has rejected it because of this the issue again came up in January But the decision has been taken and it cannot be implemented in MaharashtrardquoAlso ReadMaharashtra Rent Act controversy Tenants want to be made home ownersRaj Purohit the BJP MLA from Colaba claimed that it was all a rumour and hence the chief minister and the housing minister gave a clarification ldquoThe CM met us along with Prakash Mehta and he CM categorically mentioned that there will be no amendment in the Rent Control Actrdquo said PurohitShah said that now he feels that the government has backtracked seeing the matter would affect it in the 2017 BMC polls ldquoLodha told us that it was a serious proposal but now seeing Sena and Congress aggressively opposing it the government must have taken a uturn on the issuerdquoAlso Read Tenants up in arms against amendment of rent actAccording to BJP sources the party realised a bit late that the government was losing a major vote bank by remaining quiet and the Sena and Congress were taking up the matter too aggressively ldquoTo be honest we were losing the battle and we had to tell the CM to issue a statement and hence on Thursday he said there is no plan of amending the rent Act We have to go to voters in 2017 and if this continues the Sena would have gainedrdquo said the MLA from BJP The matter had gone so out of hand for the BJP that even state president Raosaheb Danve had to come in He said ldquoWe had discussed the same issue nearly 6 months ago and then again we discussed it with the CM and he said the government has no plans of amending the rent actrdquoTaking creditThe Sena and Congress did not waste time to take credit as South Mumbai means a lot of votes during the BMC election and no one wants to lose themPandurang Sakpal Vibhag Pramukh of South Mumbai said ldquoAfter the Shiv Sena carried out a signature campaign and protested on the roads the chief minister withdrew the amendmentrdquoAlso Read Should we keep our bags packed wonders old SoBo residentMilind Deora former South Mumbai MP said ldquoWe have decided to cancel the morcha on Sunday but will continue the agitation and awareness programme through karyakartas against the model rent Act and implementation of ownership scheme Maharashtra governmentrsquos intent is highly suspicious The solution to tenant vs builder dispute is rejection of the Centrersquos Draft Model Tenancy Act amp tenant ownershiprdquoNCP leader Sachin Ahir claimed that it was due to his party that the government took away the amendment