In fact, the maximum number of illegal constructions have been built by the corporators themselves, whose activities have also turned the Development Plan into a completely worthless document, Town Planning officials say. Official records indicate that of the 204 reserved plots, 189 have been usurped by corporators.

Curiously, the genesis of encroachments dates back to half a century ago, when the barracks in Camp 4 and 5 areas sheltered refugees displaced by Partition. However, since they were far from other settlements, people were reluctant to move in, so the locals gladlyobliged, recalls advocate Prahlad Advani (75) former president of the Ulhasnagar Municipal Council (1954-55), who was among the first to arrive.

Sporadic rioting between the refugees and locals brought the Central Rehabilitation Secretary, K P Mathrani, to the town on May 11, 1965, when he declared that structures pre-dating 1965 would be regularised. Scenting the opportunity to grab accommodation, owners of new structures tried every trick in the book to convert their illegal structures into legitimate constructions.

Though he denies it, Advani's detractors claim he is partly responsible for regularising such buildings by charging penalties instead of razing them when he was UMC president. Every time there was talk of demolitions, it was effectively scuttled by corporators who played up passions by pitting the Sindhi and non-Sindhis and refugees and non-refugees against each other. The resultant tension forced the authorities to withdraw and by the end of 1965, illegal shanties and tenements had sprungup in Maratha section in Camp 4, Subhash Nagar and on both sides of the railway tracks.

``Rampant corruption at the civic level began then,'' says Advani, who adds that corporators themselves have constructed the maximum number of illegal structures. Wising up to the benefits of using muscle-power, the corporators erected a chain of shakhas and offices all over the city to monitor new constructions. ``These became collection centres for protection money,'' says a former Shiv Sainik, who now mans the Akhil Bharatiya Sena office at Hiraghat. In this manner, they nurtured votebanks comprising grateful residents. ``There was no stopping the corporators,'' says former mayor Ganesh Chowdhary. ``Nodal areas grew so congested that there was no space left to build roads.''

Encroachments and illegal constructions peaked during the reign of former Congress legislator and UMC president, Pappu Kalani (1986-1992), which coincided with the real estate boom. Builders and developers in Ulhasnagar had never had such afield day before. No wonder they called it the `Golden Age'. ``There were no setback lines and no FSI laws,'' reminisces a developer, who owns seven buildings in Camp 1. ``We had an understanding to pay Kalani Rs 25 per square foot (the current rate is five times that),'' he reveals, adding: ``In return, Kalani saw that no official ever came to us asking for papers of any kind.''

The people Kalani carefully cultivated at the state Secretariat ensured that the Urban Development Department (UDD), which oversees civic bodies in the state, looked the other away while encroachments gnawed into 65 per cent of the reserved plots in the municipal limits. After Kalani's arrest in November 1992, Sena strongman Gopal Rajwani followed in his footsteps. Rajwani was arrested under the MPDA in December 1998 and is currently in the Yerawada Jail.

The rot has sunk in so deep that the Rs 3.5-crore unauthorised Shivam shopping complex built in October 1997 near Gajanan market is still standing despite the state government'sinstructions to demolish it. Not a single brick has been dislodged despite the Ulhasnagar court's stay on its demolition being vacated and orders of former chief minister Manohar Joshi (who held the Urban Development portfolio) and of UDD Secretary K Nandlal in January 1998 to raze it. The chief promoter of the complex is Rajwani.

Interestingly, Joshi's orders were followed by instructions from Minister of State for Urban Development, Ravindra Mane, restraining the UMC from taking any action. ``With confusing signals like that, how can the UMC do anything,'' asks an Anti-Encroachment officer. In February alone, anti-encroachment staff were beaten up thrice and the civic office ransacked by mobs protesting the demolition of a water fountain at Camp 3 and an unauthorised office of the Republican Party of India at Subhash Nagar.Deputy Municipal Commissioner in charge of demolitions, B D Vanmali, who has been assaulted twice, says there is little even the police can do in the face of fierce politicalpressures.

Asked whether the UMC plans to flatten opposition from builders with the bulldozer, Municipal Commissioner A D Kale, who took over three months ago, says: ``Since the problem is widespread it will take a while.'' He says the demolition of Vidyarthi Minar at Nehru Chowk, Camp 2, which is owned by former MLA, P Vidyarthi, is underway. ``We have got the green signal from Mantralaya to raze Shivam too.''