5 Key Takeaways
- The Gurugram District Registrar restored restrictions barring EWS residents at Mahindra Aura from the central park and common areas, reversing earlier relief.
- The new order says access to common parks and green spaces must be governed strictly by the registered conveyance deed and approved society bye-laws.
- The RWA argues that conveyance deeds and allotment letters exclude EWS allottees from central park and common facilities, and that EWS residents cannot become RWA members.
- EWS residents such as Kashmir Singh and Meena Rani say the reversal brings back exclusion and leaves them with limited access and few grievance options.
- The dispute highlights unresolved questions about who belongs in the housing complex, who can access shared spaces, and whose voices count in its governance.
After Brief Relief, Gurugram Complex Again Bars EWS Families From Central Park and Common Areas
For a few days, 70-year-old Kashmir Singh, his wife Meena Rani, and other residents of the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) category at Mahindra Aura in Gurugram’s Sector 110A were finally able to enter their housing complex’s central park. Then the access was withdrawn.
A fresh order from the District Registrar of Firms and Societies, Gurugram, has restored the restrictions, saying common parks and green spaces must be governed strictly by the society’s registered conveyance deed and approved bye-laws.
The reversal has brought distress to EWS families who had briefly obtained relief after the district administration intervened in September. On September 15, the District Registrar directed the Aura Resident Welfare Association (RWA) to lift all restrictions on EWS occupants. That order granted EWS residents unfettered access to common spaces. But on September 28, the RWA submitted a representation seeking a modification of that order. The new memorandum, issued on Thursday, October 1, accepts the RWA’s position and sends the dispute back to the society’s founding documents.
“The Association shall strictly proceed in accordance with the provisions contained in the registered Conveyance Deed and the approved Bye-laws of the Association. Any rights, usage, restrictions or other matters relating to the common parks and green spaces shall be governed by and dealt with strictly in accordance with the aforesaid documents.”
To understand the dispute, it helps to know what those documents are. A conveyance deed is the legal instrument that transfers property rights from a developer to a buyer or resident group. Bye-laws are the registered rules that govern a resident association’s membership, voting, maintenance responsibilities, and access to common facilities. In this case, the RWA argues that these documents specifically exclude EWS allottees from the central park and other common facilities inside the main residential complex.
RWA president S S Gill, a 65-year-old retired Border Security Force officer, laid out the association’s reasoning in the representation. He said:
“The conveyance deeds and allotment letters executed in favour of the EWS allottees specifically exclude the Central Park and other common facilities within the main residential complex from the property rights to them.”
The RWA also pointed out that regular owners fund the maintenance of the society. The representation argued:
“It is not permissible on any ground, humanitarian or otherwise, to encroach upon the property owned by someone else. EWS members are not members of RWA … and hence have no right to complain against the RWA to the district registrar.”
Under the society’s bye-laws, EWS allottees can neither become members of the Aura RWA nor gain access to the facilities and services meant for other residents. The RWA’s position is that the EWS allotments were created with a different legal status, and that the central park and other common spaces belong to the residents who pay for their upkeep.
Welcoming the new order, Gill said, “The lawful position has been restored, and the earlier order corrected.” He added, “Societal norms need not always be explicit, they must be understood.”
Rajesh Arora, another resident, said, “It is a crystal clear order. Residents are very happy … No one will allow me to enter a Gymkhana by force, right?”
For Kashmir Singh, however, the order is not clear at all. He said the reversal has brought back a sense of exclusion. “It’s wrong. The order is also not clear unlike the earlier order. At our age, we only wish to spend some quality time at the central park for our wellbeing,” he said.
Kashmir said the earlier restrictions had left him and his wife largely confined to their home. The relief they received in September felt like a rare moment of fairness. Now, he says, the family is being told once again that the central park and other common areas are not meant for them. He questioned why the EWS residents have so few places to raise grievances. “Around 90% of the EWS flats are anyway occupied by them (non-EWS allottees) who bought them when they were put on resale… there must be hardly six-seven EWS families apart from us. Where do we go with our grievances if they say we can’t be RWA members either?” he asked.
The RWA’s representation did mention that EWS residents have access to a small park near their block. It also pointed out that they can use a park maintained by the Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority outside the complex. But for older residents like Kashmir and Meena Rani, that does not resolve the deeper problem. Meena, who suffers from diabetic retinal vision loss, said the reversal felt like an act of arbitrary power. “We are back to the time when rulers could suppress voices as per their whims … What do they want? Why are they targeting us instead of living together amicably? Why was the order reversed?” she asked.
The immediate effect of the new order is that EWS residents are once again barred from using the central park and other common spaces inside Mahindra Aura. The district administration has effectively said that those questions must be answered by the conveyance deed and the society’s bye-laws, not by an administrative directive. That leaves the Singhs and the few other EWS families in the complex with little recourse inside the RWA framework, since the bye-laws bar them from membership.
The dispute is not simply about a park. It is about who belongs, who can access shared spaces, and whose voices count in the governance of a housing complex. For now, the central park remains off-limits to EWS residents, and the legal and social divide inside Mahindra Aura remains unresolved.
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