<p>President Pratibha Patil, being the first woman to occupy the exalted post, hardly made any news during her five-year tenure. With less than three months to go for her to vacate the Rashtrapati Bhavan, however, she is making news -- for all the wrong reasons.<br /><br /></p>.<p>To ensure that a person who has held the post of the President of India has a decent dwelling after retirement, the Parliament, in its wisdom, enacted the President’s Emoluments and pension Act, 1951. Under the President’s Pension Rule, 1962, the former President is entitled to hire a 2,000 sq ft bungalow or avail a government-owned Class V bungalow measuring 4,500 sq ft on availability, on any government land. <br /><br />Moreover, the entitlement specifies only plinth area and not the plot size as even in Delhi, Class-VIII bungalows stand on different plot sizes and the rule does not provide for new construction on any government land. But, for her post-retirement plan, President Pratibha Patil and her family has stirred up a hornet’s nest by allegedly misusing the services of Defence Estate Service to ‘grab’ a huge chunk of land and trying to build a massive bungalow in the Khadki Cantonment area in Pune through a controversial acquisition of a property worth crores of rupees.<br /><br />According to information obtained by some RTI activists, Ms Patil, the supreme commander of the armed forces, after scouring the verdant rolling hills of Khadki Cantonment, zeroed in on two old colonial bungalows with a combined area of 2.61 lakh sq ft of land or 5.2 acres. It is said that the current commercial value of the property is around Rs 130 crore. <br /><br />While one of the bungalows housing an army official was graded as A-1 (a grade specifying the plot as army land), the adjoining bungalow categorised as B-3 (a grade wherein a plot is on perpetual lease) belonged to an 86-year-old civilian, Pesi Anklesaria.<br /><br />Talking to Deccan Herald from Pune, Anklesaria said: “I had bought this bungalow in 2005 for Rs 16 lakh. It was owned by Rhoda Khambata family since 1906. Last July they (Defence Estate Office) just came and took over. They said they wanted to convert the plot from B-3 to A-1 and deposited Rs 1 lakh, and I moved the court challenging the government’s diktat. But the local administration is dragging its feet. It is beyond my comprehension when the matter is in the court, how come they just fenced off the two bungalows including mine? They have hacked trees which locals have been worshipping for generations. And what was shocking was that they pulled down the structures which I and my friends --retired officials -- found out that it is not permitted even under ‘Special Repairs,’ rules.”<br /><br />Unreality of the scenario<br /><br />While Anklesaria was still trying to come to terms with the unreality of the scenario, two retired armed forces officials, Cdr Pathak of Indian Ex-Service Men (IESM) and Lt.Col Patil founder of Justice for Jawans (JFJ) along with Awasthi, moved RTI applications seeking information on the bizarre drama playing out in Khadki Cantonment.<br /><br />Cdr (Retd) Pathak said: “We are collecting signatures from across the country and a PIL is being drafted and would be moved in Supreme Court soon. It is surprising that such brazen violation of laws can take place. Our main point is if the authorities have converted Anklesaria’s plot into A-1 (an Army land) then post-retirement, Ms Patil becomes a civilian, excluding her from residing there because only armed forces people can stay in A-1.”<br /><br />As the issue is bound to snowball into a major embarrassment to the UPA government, several retired defence personnel, including Cdr Ravindra Pathak , Lt Col Suresh Patil and RTI activist Anoop Awasthi and dozens of former armed forces officers have joined hands to to fight for ‘justice.’<br />But the State in its enthusiasm to please the outgoing president, over-ruling every objection raised, has twisted and cut every corner to construct a new bungalow, according ton Ms Patil’s architectural specifications.<br /><br />"It is such an irony that thousands of jawans stay in one-tenement quarters but nobody seems to be bothered about them at all. And here we are pulling down residential quarters, fencing off a huge swathe of army land to cater to the whims and caprices of a person who could have easily selected a place outside cantonment confines,” said an Army officer<br /><br />Moreover, the construction has also led to the hacking of trees, some of them centuries old. Lt.Col (Retd) Suresh Patil of JFJ says, “Since my retirement, we have planted over one million trees in Pune. And here to construct a villa in violation of all laid down laws they just hacked the trees without any qualms. And now because of the furore…they are violating another serious cantonment rule. In a cantonment ,for security reasons, fencing cannot exceed 3 ft height...but here the boundary wall pole-vaults to 10 ft. But then who bothers? If one can throw law books to winds then one can also throw security to winds.”<br /><br />The voices of protests from Pune are likely to become louder in the days to come.</p>
<p>President Pratibha Patil, being the first woman to occupy the exalted post, hardly made any news during her five-year tenure. With less than three months to go for her to vacate the Rashtrapati Bhavan, however, she is making news -- for all the wrong reasons.<br /><br /></p>.<p>To ensure that a person who has held the post of the President of India has a decent dwelling after retirement, the Parliament, in its wisdom, enacted the President’s Emoluments and pension Act, 1951. Under the President’s Pension Rule, 1962, the former President is entitled to hire a 2,000 sq ft bungalow or avail a government-owned Class V bungalow measuring 4,500 sq ft on availability, on any government land. <br /><br />Moreover, the entitlement specifies only plinth area and not the plot size as even in Delhi, Class-VIII bungalows stand on different plot sizes and the rule does not provide for new construction on any government land. But, for her post-retirement plan, President Pratibha Patil and her family has stirred up a hornet’s nest by allegedly misusing the services of Defence Estate Service to ‘grab’ a huge chunk of land and trying to build a massive bungalow in the Khadki Cantonment area in Pune through a controversial acquisition of a property worth crores of rupees.<br /><br />According to information obtained by some RTI activists, Ms Patil, the supreme commander of the armed forces, after scouring the verdant rolling hills of Khadki Cantonment, zeroed in on two old colonial bungalows with a combined area of 2.61 lakh sq ft of land or 5.2 acres. It is said that the current commercial value of the property is around Rs 130 crore. <br /><br />While one of the bungalows housing an army official was graded as A-1 (a grade specifying the plot as army land), the adjoining bungalow categorised as B-3 (a grade wherein a plot is on perpetual lease) belonged to an 86-year-old civilian, Pesi Anklesaria.<br /><br />Talking to Deccan Herald from Pune, Anklesaria said: “I had bought this bungalow in 2005 for Rs 16 lakh. It was owned by Rhoda Khambata family since 1906. Last July they (Defence Estate Office) just came and took over. They said they wanted to convert the plot from B-3 to A-1 and deposited Rs 1 lakh, and I moved the court challenging the government’s diktat. But the local administration is dragging its feet. It is beyond my comprehension when the matter is in the court, how come they just fenced off the two bungalows including mine? They have hacked trees which locals have been worshipping for generations. And what was shocking was that they pulled down the structures which I and my friends --retired officials -- found out that it is not permitted even under ‘Special Repairs,’ rules.”<br /><br />Unreality of the scenario<br /><br />While Anklesaria was still trying to come to terms with the unreality of the scenario, two retired armed forces officials, Cdr Pathak of Indian Ex-Service Men (IESM) and Lt.Col Patil founder of Justice for Jawans (JFJ) along with Awasthi, moved RTI applications seeking information on the bizarre drama playing out in Khadki Cantonment.<br /><br />Cdr (Retd) Pathak said: “We are collecting signatures from across the country and a PIL is being drafted and would be moved in Supreme Court soon. It is surprising that such brazen violation of laws can take place. Our main point is if the authorities have converted Anklesaria’s plot into A-1 (an Army land) then post-retirement, Ms Patil becomes a civilian, excluding her from residing there because only armed forces people can stay in A-1.”<br /><br />As the issue is bound to snowball into a major embarrassment to the UPA government, several retired defence personnel, including Cdr Ravindra Pathak , Lt Col Suresh Patil and RTI activist Anoop Awasthi and dozens of former armed forces officers have joined hands to to fight for ‘justice.’<br />But the State in its enthusiasm to please the outgoing president, over-ruling every objection raised, has twisted and cut every corner to construct a new bungalow, according ton Ms Patil’s architectural specifications.<br /><br />"It is such an irony that thousands of jawans stay in one-tenement quarters but nobody seems to be bothered about them at all. And here we are pulling down residential quarters, fencing off a huge swathe of army land to cater to the whims and caprices of a person who could have easily selected a place outside cantonment confines,” said an Army officer<br /><br />Moreover, the construction has also led to the hacking of trees, some of them centuries old. Lt.Col (Retd) Suresh Patil of JFJ says, “Since my retirement, we have planted over one million trees in Pune. And here to construct a villa in violation of all laid down laws they just hacked the trees without any qualms. And now because of the furore…they are violating another serious cantonment rule. In a cantonment ,for security reasons, fencing cannot exceed 3 ft height...but here the boundary wall pole-vaults to 10 ft. But then who bothers? If one can throw law books to winds then one can also throw security to winds.”<br /><br />The voices of protests from Pune are likely to become louder in the days to come.</p>
