Raigad district administration officials on Friday started demolishing diamantaire Nirav Modi’s bungalow — Roopanya — at Kihim in Alibaug. The exercise is expected to continue for more than a week.
Raigad Collector Vijay Suryawanshi said, “The bungalow spread across 20,000 square feet has reinforced cement concrete and vintage-style stones. We will have to use heavy machinery to pull down the structure. The exercise will take around 10 days.”
“On Thursday, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) seized valuable vintage items from Mr. Modi’s house. Around three trucks of goods were taken away by the agency, which it might put up for auction. In 2007, close to 159 building in Alibaug were found to be illegal as they came under the CRZ and flouted the MRTP rules. The Bombay High Court had asked the collector to take appropriate action on these structures. Most of them took a stay from the court while 58 had not. This bungalow is among those 58 on whom we started the demolition,” Alibaug tehsildar Sachin Shejal said.
On Friday morning, Mr. Suryawanshi and sub-divisional officer Sharada Powar conducted a survey and chalked out a plan.
The demolition started by around 4.30 p.m. using two JCBs. From Saturday, the officers have called for two more Poclain hydraulics.
Mr. Modi’s bungalow is the 12th structure in Alibaug to be razed. Previously, five were demolished at Nagao, four at Revdanda, one each at Mandwa and Dokavda. “In 2011, Mr. Modi had sought to legalise the structure by providing some documents before the then district collector. In 2018, we filed an affidavit claiming that we need to review the order, and on December 4, I declared it unauthorised and issued a notice to demolish the structure,” Mr. Suryawanshi said.
Mr. Modi’s bungalow was attached by the ED for his involvement in the ₹13,000 crore Punjab National Bank fraud case.
“On Thursday, after the ED seized and took away the belongings from the bungalow, handed over the structure to us for demolition. After the bungalow was declared unauthorised in December, we had sent a notice to Mr. Modi to get his bungalow pulled down himself. Since there was no reply, we started the demolition,” Ms. Powar said.
Mr. Suryawanshi said, “After the demolition, whatever remains inside the bungalow will be handed over to the ED. The attached furniture will be demolished along with the structure.”
