MUMBAI: Residents of the Central Government Employee Colony (CGS) at Antop Hill sat on an indefinite protest on Saturday, along with the women and children of their families, to demand increased security in their campus. Around 10,000 residents live in the 150 buildings in this 90-acre green colony and most of the employees work in departments like income tax, customs, excise, the defence services and the Intelligence Bureau.
Event Context
Sion-Koliwada MLA Tamil Selvan is actively opposed to the shortcut being shut down. “There are two schools, one hospital, two clinics, one pathology lab and even the ACP’s office operating from within,” he said. “These are public places and should be kept accessible for all. The new residents association cannot unfairly shut the shortcut access, particularly since it would be very inconvenient for school children to walk all the way around to their school.” Selvan added that a section of CGS residents also wanted the exits to be kept accessible and had written to him about this.
Player Focus
Refuting this, Shivaji Pawle, senior inspector at Antop Hill Police Station, told HT that CGS colony was one of the most secure places in their jurisdiction. “We have increased patrolling here as we have done in other areas,” he claimed. “This is quite a secure area, with our own assistant police commissioner (ACP)’s office located in there. This place has a secure boundary with gates, and it is not right to say that there are security issues.” Pawle added that the police always registered complaints and acted on them.
Team Analysis
The residents were particularly peeved about not being allowed to build a wicket gate at a shortcut, which, they alleged, was being used by outsiders to enter their colony, thereby threatening the security of their women and children. Dharmendra Kumar Yadav complained that his own boundary wall was broken at places, facilitating the entry of unsavoury entities. “There are 21 gardens inside the colony which are unusable due to outsiders, couples, drunkards and drug addicts coming in,” he said. “Locked houses are also routinely broken into.”
The women complained about being sexually harassed and about couples indulging in PDA, making it unsafe for children to be let out to play or even to run errands. Many women told HT that they were catcalled, subjected to lewd comments and even flashed while on errands outside. “If our husbands try to prevent outsiders from coming in, they face false charges of sexual harassment by random women,” stated Suman Bhinchar. “Today, we are out here to support them.”
Sunil Bhinchar, president of the local residents welfare association, said that alcohol and even drugs were consumed on the internal roads of the colony at night. Akhilesh Yadav, a naval employee who recently got transferred here, said, “My wife is unable to go for morning and night walks on our streets due to the couples and groups of men hanging out there.”
The residents said that when the government failed to provide security despite repeated demands, the newly elected residents welfare association decided to collect money to get their own security guards. “However, even the guards were threatened by the neighbourhood slum dwellers when they stopped the latter from entering the residential complex,” said a resident. “Even worse, we get no help from the local police.”
After HT sent a questionnaire to Central Public Works Department officials, an official responded saying that the matter had been “already taken up”. Security, he said, was not under the purview of the CPWD but the responsibility of the residents welfare association.
