Gurgaon: Local MLA Rakesh Daultabad on Saturday pledged to introduce a private member’s bill, seeking to amend the Haryana Registration and Regulation of Societies (HRRS) Act 2012, in the assembly session slated for February. The bill aims at ensuring faster resolution of disputes in residential societies across the city and bringing in more transparency in the functioning of RWAs, he said.
More than 5,000 societies and firms are registered in Gurgaon with the office of the district registrar. Though disputes related to the functioning of RWAs, including imposition of illegal rules, misappropriation of funds and manipulation of records, have been cropping up time and again, “there is a lack of action on such complaints of residents, due to a nexus between corrupt government officials and RWA office-bearers”, the MLA said.
“The existing Act has been deficient in its current form in addressing the present-day requirement and it is an impending necessity to amend the same to make the public office accountable (office of the district registrar) for its action. This would bring in transparen-cy in its functioning as well as that in RWAs,” Daultabad said at a press conference in Gurgaon.
The draft of amendme-nt to the HRSS Act also proposes to appoint the district registrar not below the rank of Class-I officer and deputy district registrars or assistant district registrars not below the rank of Class-II officers.
“RWA office bearers are deemed to be ‘public servants’ while discharging their duties in financial matters in an association and any misconduct in financial matters should be treated as embezzlement of funds by such office-bearers under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, to provide greater accountability, ” said Gaurav Kalra, a member of Parivartan Sangh.
Other provisions of the proposed amendment includes the right of membership to all owners with no membership fee and annual subscription, right to vote and contest election to joint owners, and ‘one society, one RWA’. Moreover, the bill aims at fixing the term of the governing body for two years, and to a maximum of two consecutive terms.
Many have hailed the MLA’s decision to introduce the bill.
“The district registrar’s office is the melting pot of all the ‘bonafide’ corrupt practices in RWAs,” said Yogesh Saini, a resident of DLF-5. Another resident and RWA president of Sector 10A, Udayvir Yadav, however, said that “the amendment should not only deal with problems of the gated societies but needs to focus on the needs of the HSVP sectors and plotted colonies too.”