A private school in Mumbai’s Charkop area, which has been given authority by MHADA to maintain an open ground, has insisted that visitors either provide their Aadhaar card or a police no objection certificate (NOC) before entering, Mumbai Mirror reported on Tuesday.

According to the report, MMRDA gave the 30,000 square foot ground on lease to Vidya Shikshak Prasarak Mandal Trust that runs Akshara High School. The school is located right in front of the ground.

Interestingly, the trust is run by former Maharashtra agriculture minister Ranjeet Deshmukh, and his son Ashish, who is a BJP MLA from Katol.

However, according to the Bombay High Court, general public can access Mumbai’s open spaces between 5.30 am and 7.30 am, and then in the evening between 5 pm and 7 pm. Denying people entry during these times can attract prosecution, as per the law.

In 2017, DNA had reported that while on paper, the BMC will release 216 open spaces to NGOs and citizen groups, in reality most of these spaces are controlled by netas.

If we calculated the cost of these open spaces that measure up to 250 acres, it runs into thousands of crores of rupees as they exist at prime locations across the city.

According to Garden department of BMC, there are around 1,068 open spaces available with the civic body which are spread over 1,200 acres and these are spread across the city, western and the eastern suburbs. The civic administration claims that out of 1,068 open spaces, only 216 open spaces will be given to citizen groups, NGOs and private organisations to maintain. And, the civic administration will ensure that the garden should not be used for other purposes. However, activists and a few corporators believe that the civic administration will give away all these plots gradually.