Need advice: Parking rules & regulations in Mumbai's housing societies

Some members, who already have parking spots, are buying additional cars & trying to pressurise those who have closed garages to give up their regular parking & exclusively park only in their garages.

BHPian Mortis recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Hi, is anyone here familiar with the Mumbai co-operative housing society rules and regulations with regards to parking? As usual with any housing society in Mumbai, parking space is at a premium and in our building, it's becoming more and more of an issue lately so I wanted to clarify some of the rules.

The crux of the matter is that some members who already have parking spots are buying additional cars and trying to pressurise those who have closed garages to give up their regular parking and exclusively park only in their garages. Is this valid even though the parking spaces have been assigned on a first-come basis and all the garage owners are old members who have both types of parking?

I would like to clarify a few points for more clarity.

• Closed garages were sold to members by the builder for an additional fee. Most garage owners are original flat + garage owners except for 2 cases where members have bought the garage from the original owners.
• Parking slots have been marked out and allocated from the open common area.
• Parking slots were allocated to members on a first-come-first-served basis depending on availability.
• Closed garages attract maintenance charges + tax or whatever the necessary dues are.
• Open common parking slots have charges in monthly maintenance. X for first slot, 2X for 2nd slot and 3X for third slot.
• Currently not every flat has a parking slot assigned to it as some flats are not occupied or the members don't have cars.
• So far there hasn't been a limit as such to how many slots have been assigned to a flat based on size. There are 2 wings in the society. One with 1bhk and 2bhk per floor and the other wing has two 3bhks per floor. There are 1bhks with 2 cars and 3bhks with 1 car. Multiple members own multiple flats in the same or both wings.
• There is roughly one open slot available per flat or maybe slightly lesser.

Hope this information helps in getting further advice.

Right now it's mostly the newer members who already have a couple of open parking slots already demanding more slots as their right because they "paid so much more" for their flats and demanding that garage owners park exclusively in their garages only and cannot park in the common areas. There are also some crackpots demanding that the garages be made into a common area and rotated between members on a yearly basis.

My point is this wrt common rules and logic. Can a member who has paid an additional lump sum for a closed garage be forced to park inside only and not make use of the common free space even though they have occupied that space since the society has been formed and those who are requesting extra parking have at least one slot already themselves? It seems totally illogical to me that one member has to pay a % of their flat's value for a parking while another gets it for free? No doubt there is the benefit of it being covered and more secure but additional charges are being paid for that as well.

Obviously, I am one of the affected owners which is why I started this thread. Overall I am not too worried because if this rule is enforced then anyway the same number of slots that I vacate will also have to be vacated by other members anyways to allow right of way access to my garages so the net benefit will be zero.

It's just that this shady and petty behaviour is happening all too often and I want to sort it out before things escalate.

There are another couple of parking issues that I will get into later.

Greatly appreciate any help.

Here's what GTO had to say about the matter:

Parking is a big deal in Mumbai and it's always better to take professional advice. Would suggest consulting with a good lawyer.

• To start off, open up a new thread on https://www.kaanoon.com/. Approximately 1000 bucks. You'll get good advice there.
• Have a paid consultation with Ajay Sethi (you'll see his profile on Kaanoon.com).
• Let me know if you need any more property lawyers who are experts in housing society matters. I know some very good fighters who will battle tooth & nail for you.

Here's what BHPian ColAjayDrives had to say about the matter:

The Parking Rules totally depend on the Bye-Laws created by your RWA.

Strictly by law, car owners are required to park in their own garages which they have paid for.

To park elsewhere in the society premises needs the following understanding:

• The land where there are no buildings is a common property of all owners, also known as Undivided Area.
• Normally such areas are required to be "gifted" to the municipality at the time of layout approval. This is to allow funds for the maintenance of such areas.
• The RWA (read Management Committee) frames rules to utilize such common areas. For example, RWA may demarcate areas and allow people to park in such areas provided they pay parking fees.
• If you feel aggrieved, pls approach the MC and ask for the Bye-Laws or General Body rulings (which are equated with Bye-Laws) on the subject.
• No one can "pressurize" anyone outside the ambit of the Bye-Laws

Please feel free to ask specific questions if my reply didn't answer your query.

Here's what BHPian navin had to say about the matter:

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer nor do I have any legal background. These are the "rules" as I understand them.

• The Open area (aka the area that is not covered by stilt or fully enclosed garage) is to be shared equally by all members and cannot be allocated for the use of specific members even if the said members are willing to pay a consideration for the same. If some portion of the open area is to be used for parking all members must have equal access to this parking either by lottery, rotation or "first arrival for the day".
• All members are equal. Regardless if they own a 1BHK, 2BHK, 4BHK, etc. And regardless of what they paid for their apartment. If one member owns 2 apartments they can get separate parking stilts/garages allocated/sold to them for each apartment.
• Garages and Stilt areas are for the use of specific members as they have been sold to that member. Many societies issue a separate share certificate for each garage. Hence garages and stilt areas do not need to be shared and a member who owns a garage or stilt parking has as much right to open parking as a member who has NO garage or stilt parking.

Hence:

Open parking spaces cannot be officially allocated to specific members and must be shared (most societies have some form of lottery, rotational use or first-arrival use where those members who arrive early in the day find parking and the rest have to fend for themselves).

Members may choose to cooperate and park in a specific spot each day (provided that spot is available) as a matter of convenience (you develop a habit of reversing or manoeuvring your car in a specific fashion into a specific spot). This is usually the case when a Society has enough open area to allocate one open parking per member.

Argument 5 in your post is invalid. The Society cannot officially terminally charge members for fixed open parking spots because the society cannot determine the use of these spots for specific members. In other words, the Society is not in a position to rent open areas out for the permanent use of any specific member. If a member gets a spot via lottery or rotation then the Society can only charge that member for the period of their lottery/rotation (typically 1 year, but I have seen some societies use 2 weeks rotation as well).

Since all open spaces need to be shared equally, argument 6 does not hold. If there are more cars and fewer parking spots then societies either allocate via lottery, rotate the parking or use a first arrival rule.

If the Society can allocate as many parking spots as there are apartments then members might choose to cooperate and use the same parking spot. However unless each member has got one parking spot, no member can be allocated a second parking spot. Similarly, unless all members have been allocated 2 parking spots, no member can be allocated a third parking spot.

Hope this helps.

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