Campa Cola: civic officials start snapping water, power

Civic officials today entered the Campa Cola compound in South Mumbai as the residents gave up their stiff resistance of three days and cut off water and power connections to some of the illegal flats in the plush complex.
A senior official said the civic body will file a contempt of court petition against the occupants as they did not comply with the Supreme Court order that had allowed the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) to go ahead with the demolition process.
"Out of the total 90 flats that had water connections, three connections were disconnected today, along with 55 electricity connections. Similarly, out of total 48 piped gas connections, MCGM officials managed to disconnect 14 connections," Deputy Municipal Commissioner Anand Waghralkar told PTI.

He said the civic body will continue its operations tomorrow in compliance with the Supreme Court order and will ensure that all connections providing essential supply to illegal flats are snapped at the earliest.
MCGM had formed 12 teams to disconnect the essential supply to the total 96 illegal flats on 35 floors.
After backing out from their stand of preventing the entry of MCGM officials in the compound, the residents, following the intervention of state chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, had yesterday apologised to the MCGM for the inconvenience caused because of them and finally let the civic officials in to cut the water and power supply to illegal flats on the complex located in Worli of South Mumbai.

"After a long struggle, the residents finally cooperated with us and let us do our job peacefully. Had they not resisted earlier, it would have been easier for both, the residents as well as the MCGM," Waghralkar said.
Asked if MCGM would file a contempt of court petition against the residents for defying the apex court order by not letting the civic officials do their work for three days, Waghralkar said filing a contempt petition is "inevitable" now.