In a judgment pronounced on August 28, 2026, Justice Amit Borkar held that an electricity record can establish that a structure existed and that an electricity connection was provided to it. However, when a person claims a specific entitlement on the basis of commercial use, additional prescribed evidence demonstrating the nature of that use is required.

The ruling came in Writ Petition No. 7099 of 2016 filed by Ganpat Krishna Parte against the High Power Committee, Government of Maharashtra, the Slum Rehabilitation Authority, BMC, Nalanda CHS Ltd and Money Magnum Nest Pvt. Ltd.

The dispute

The dispute concerned Hut No. 55, which was recorded in the SRA-related Annexure-II as a residential hutment.

Parte claimed that the structure was actually being used for commercial purposes and therefore sought recognition of his entitlement to a commercial rehabilitation premises.

His principal evidence was a commercial electricity connection. According to the petitioner, the connection had been obtained in 1992 in his name and was still recorded as a commercial connection.

The electricity company subsequently confirmed the existence of the connection and its commercial nature.

The petitioner argued that this demonstrated that the hut was being used for commercial purposes well before the relevant qualifying date.

How the matter unfolded

1976: Original hut record

In 1976, the Assistant Commissioner of BMC’s ‘N’ Ward issued a Pitch Card for Hut No. 85/6 in the name of the petitioner’s brother, Madhukar G. Parte. The hut was shown as residential.

1985: Petitioner begins residing in another hut

In 1985, Parte began residing with his wife and family members in Hut No. 478 and obtained a residential electricity connection for it.

1992: Commercial electricity connection

In 1992, he started a canteen business in the hut in question and obtained a commercial electricity connection.

This commercial connection became the central piece of evidence in his subsequent claim.

2000: Annexure-II and SRA scheme

On May 29, 2000, BMC issued Annexure-II for development of the slum under the rehabilitation scheme.

Hut No. 55 was shown as a censused hut on the basis of the earlier Pitch Card. However, the hut in which Parte was residing was separately shown as eligible for residential purposes in the name of his wife.

The accompanying slum plan also showed the two huts separately.

2005-2008: Claim for commercial status

In 2005, Parte approached the Secretary of the Slum Rehabilitation Authority seeking a change of user for Hut No. 55, arguing that it had wrongly been shown as residential instead of commercial.

The matter was subsequently sent to the Assistant Commissioner for consideration.

In 2008, the electricity bill produced by Parte was sent to Reliance Energy for verification. The company confirmed that the connection had been obtained in 1992, remained operational and was a commercial connection in Parte’s name.

Despite this, the Assistant Commissioner rejected the claim for commercial use in October 2008.

2012-2013: Claim rejected again

The electricity records were again sent for verification in 2012.

Reliance Energy once more confirmed that the connection dated back to 1992 and was commercial.

Nevertheless, in September 2013, the Secretary of the SRA rejected the petitioner’s claim and confirmed the earlier decision.

2013-2015: High Power Committee

Parte then approached the High Power Committee of the Maharashtra Government.

The Committee dismissed his application on August 1, 2015, holding that the electricity bill was only secondary evidence for determining eligibility.

Parte subsequently pointed out that the applicable Government Resolution treated electricity records as proof of eligibility and challenged the Committee’s decision before the Bombay High Court.

What did the Bombay High Court examine?

The Court examined the Government Resolution dated May 16, 2015 and, importantly, looked at what the different categories of documentary evidence were actually intended to establish.

The Court found that electricity records are indeed relevant.

The Government Resolution specifically lists electricity connection documents among the records that can establish that a hutment existed on or before the relevant date.

Therefore, the Court rejected any suggestion that the electricity bill had no evidentiary value.

But the Court then drew the crucial distinction.

Existence of a property is different from its use

According to the Court, the Government Resolution makes a distinction between:

Proof that the hutment existed, and

Proof of the purpose for which the hutment was being used.

Electricity records fall under Serial No. 2 of the accompanying statement and can assist in establishing the existence of the hutment.

However, Serial No. 7 separately deals with structures claimed to have been used for commercial, professional or industrial purposes.

That category refers to documents such as a Gumasta/agency permit, restaurant licence or tax receipt obtained before January 1, 2000 and identifying the hutment or its definite location.

This distinction became decisive.

The Court said that if the petitioner’s interpretation were accepted, every commercial electricity bill would effectively have to be treated as proof of commercial eligibility.

The Court found that such an interpretation could not be derived from the language of the Government Resolution.

Other evidence pointed towards residential use

The Court also considered the municipal records.

The BMC communication recorded the hut as residential and referred to proof of residence and the occupant’s name appearing in the voter list.

The communication also noted that the income-tax returns for 2003-04 and 2004-05 described the premises as residential.

Importantly, apart from the electricity bill, the petitioner had not produced evidence such as a telephone bill or Gumasta licence to establish commercial use.

The Court did note one discrepancy: the BMC communication referred to the occupant as “Ganpat Krishna Patil”, while the petitioner before the Court was Ganpat Krishna Parte.

Because of this discrepancy, the Court did not treat the BMC communication as conclusive against Parte personally.

However, the Court still considered the communication relevant to the question of whether the hut was residential or non-residential.

Separate electricity connections did not settle the issue

Parte also argued that the two huts were separately shown and had separate electricity connections, which according to him established that he lived in one hut while conducting business from the other.

The Court accepted that separate electricity records could help establish that the two huts separately existed.

But that did not automatically prove that Hut No. 55 was being used commercially.

The Court described these as two separate questions: establishing the separate existence of the structures and establishing the nature of use of a particular structure.

What about the qualifying date?

The petitioner relied upon January 1, 1995 as the relevant date.

The Court clarified that while January 1, 1995 formed part of the factual history, the Government Resolution dated May 16, 2015 operated with January 1, 2000 as the relevant qualifying date, following a change notified in 2014.

Therefore, the petitioner could not rely on January 1, 1995 as though it remained the governing qualifying date under the 2015 Government Resolution.

The redevelopment was already substantially completed

The developer also informed the Court that 58 Project Affected Persons tenements, comprising residential and commercial rehabilitation units, had already been handed over to the SRA’s Estate Department.

The developer said the residential premises offered to Parte in 2021 were not accepted by him, following which the premises were handed over to the Estate Department in February 2026.

The Court noted that the stage of implementation of the rehabilitation scheme is relevant under the Government Resolution. However, completion of the project could not by itself extinguish an otherwise established right.

In this case, the Court found that the petitioner had not established the underlying commercial right in the first place.

Court rejects natural justice argument

Parte also argued that the authorities had not provided him an effective opportunity of hearing.

The High Court did not accept this as a basis for granting him commercial eligibility.

The Court noted that the claim had been considered at several stages by the Assistant Commissioner, Secretary, Tahsildar and High Power Committee.

The electricity record had also been sent to the electricity company for verification.

Therefore, the Court found that the real dispute was not whether the electricity bill had been considered, but what legal effect could be given to it under the Government Resolution.

The Bombay High Court’s final finding

The Court ultimately held that the commercial electricity connection was relevant evidence but was not sufficient to establish commercial use in the manner required under the Government Resolution.

The petitioner had not produced the prescribed documentation capable of displacing the material showing residential use.

The Court therefore concluded that the authorities’ decision could not be described as perverse or unsupported by evidence.

The petition was consequently dismissed, the High Power Committee’s August 1, 2015 order was upheld, the Rule was discharged and there was no order as to costs.

Why this judgment matters

The broader takeaway from the judgment is not limited to the particular redevelopment dispute.

The Court has drawn an important evidentiary distinction:

A document showing that a property existed is not necessarily a document proving how that property was being used.

A commercial electricity connection can be relevant evidence of a connection to the premises and may help establish the existence of the structure. But where a person seeks an entitlement based specifically on commercial use, the nature of that use must be established through the evidence prescribed for that purpose.

In other words, a commercial meter does not, by itself, convert a property into a commercially used property for the purpose of claiming a legal entitlement based on commercial use.

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