The upcoming elections for Apartment Owners Association (AOA) at Panchsheel Greens, a high-rise in Greater Noida West, have run into a major hurdle. The developer of the society has claimed that the residents who haven’t cleared their maintenance dues wouldn’t be eligible to vote as per the UP Apartment Act and if they do then the election would be declared invalid.
A ten-members committee of residents is all set to conduct election in the society for the first time ever on March 3. However, the builder says that the election results and AOA thereby selected will be invalid.
The residents of Panchsheel Greens have been fighting the builder against charging steep maintenance dues and providing poor services for the past two years. With no solution in sight, a group of residents had stopped paying the maintenance charges.
According to the residents the only solution is to form AOA that works for the welfare of the residents. “The security services provided are not up to the mark. All the other facilities are also poorly managed. There is no way the builder can justify the steep maintenance charges,” said a resident.
The builder has a contrary view. Anuj Chowdhary, director of Panchsheel Group, said, “We are not against resident’s decision to form AOA. In fact, we had only set up the committee to conduct elections. But if some residents do not comply with the rules of UP Apartment Act and choose not to pay the pending charges, the election would be termed invalid.”
Chowdhary said that he has also written to the Greater Noida Authority and District Magistrate of Gautam Buddh Nagar to appoint officials overseeing that elections are held in a fair manner.
The maintenance charges are pending from October 2018. “The builder has asked us to pay charges from October 2018 to March 2019 and then only conduct AOA elections,” said a resident who did not want to be named.
Meanwhile, a few residents are also not happy with the selection of candidates. KB Singh, a resident, said, “We all want to form AOA but neither the election committee members nor those contesting elections are sharing their plans for the development of the society in the future. And now, this latest controversy has only added to the confusion.”
