The buck, as agitated residents of 78 cooperative group housing societies in west Delhi’s Dwarka have discovered, stops with the assistant registrar of societies. For more than two years since the residents societies submitted their documents for approval, the assistant registrar has been sitting on the documents and has failed to pass them on to the registrar.

As a result, owners have been denied access to their own properties because draws have not been held and flats not allotted.  So the owners have been forced to live elsewhere on rent and continue to pay back loans taken for these properties as well.

R K Bhardwaj, of  Sanchar Vihar CGHS, filed an application under the Right to Information Act and got a response from the assistant registrar (south), on April 8, 2010, that the process of verification of these documents was on, two years and two months after the documents had been submitted.

Following reports that members of 18 societies had resorted to self-draws of flats between January and June this year, Delhi urban development minister Raj Kumar Chauhan said he would press for registration of first information reports against members of such societies. According to a news report in the Times of India, Chauhan threatened to cut their power and water connections.

This, after the office of the registrar cooperative society (RCS) delayed the allotment of around 10,000 flats for over three years.

Members of the housing societies say there is nothing illegal in going for self-draws and that they had little options when the RCS office did not comply with repeated court orders asking it to allot flats.

“Bylaws clearly say that residential houses will be allotted by the society to its members who fulfil the prescribed conditions. How are we at fault?” asks Ashok Kumar, convenor, Association of Suffering Members of Cooperative Group Housing Societies, Delhi.

AK Bakshi, member of the association, says the matter was brought to the notice of the chief minister in a workshop held in February. “The CM assured us that we would get allotment. But nothing moved further,” he said.