Kangana Ranaut committed 'grave violations' in merging three flats, says Mumbai court

A civil court in Dindoshi, suburban Mumbai, has dismissed a plea filed by actress-filmmaker Kangana Ranaut seeking to restrain the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) from demolishing ‘unauthorized construction’ by her in the city.

The court rejected the plea on 23 December while its order became available on Thursday 31 December 2020. Judge LS Chavan noted in his order that Ranaut had merged three flats in the 16-storey building in Khar (West) into a single unit.

“In doing so, she covered the sunk area, duct area, common passage and converted free Floor Space Index (FSI) into habitable area," the judge ruled. "These are grave violations of the sanctioned plan for which the permission of the competent authority is required.”

The judge, however, granted her six weeks to challenge the ruling in the Bombay high court.

The civic authorities had issued a notice to Ranaut in March 2018 regarding the changes in the three flats. She was later sent another notice asking her to restore the structure to its original state and warned that the unauthorized construction would be demolished if she failed to do so.

In a separate action in September last year, the BMC demolished parts of a bungalow that the actress owns at Pali Hill in Bandra (West) which she had converted into her office. The action was stayed by the high court which later ruled that the BMC's demolition notice was malicious and ordered the corporation to compensate Ranaut and allow her to reconstruct the demolished portions and regularize the construction.