Battlelines drawn?

The resignation of Bombay Parsi Punchayet (BPP) trustee Muncherji Cama from the Parsi Lying-In Hospital (PLIH) Managing Committee (MC) a few weeks ago has set the grounds for possible impending legal proceedings between the Hospital and the BPP.

Cama’s presence on both boards was proving to be a hindrance to initiating legal proceedings. "After all it could not be a case of Cama versus Cama,” noted a member of the MC. Technically Cama could have continued to hold both the offices but he would have been caught in the crossfire and could have been accused by either party of betraying their trust. Cama had made several attempts to resolve the dispute between two sides, but was unable to broker a peace.

In Cama’s place the MC has inducted Kersee Randeria, founder member of the Alert Zoroastrians Association (AZA) which fought the 2008 BPP trusteeship election and supported Cama’s candidature in mid-2011. Randeria is an anathema to several of the BPP trustees mainly World Alliance of Parsi Irani Zarthoshtis (WAPIZ) founder trustees Khojeste Mistree and Yazdi Desai and BPP chairman Dinshaw Mehta. Though Mehta and Randeria had formed an electoral alliance last year to support Cama’s candidature against WAPIZ activist and Desai’s wife, Anahita, relations have been strained between the two. Randeria owns the year-old weekly Parsi Times.

The tussle between the BPP and PLIH occurred over a proposal made by a group of prominent doctors who formed Krimson Health Ventures Private Limited to take over the renovation and running of the Hospital in return for monetary compensation (see "Ratify the agreement,” Parsiana, June 7, 2012). The BPP was and is at loggerheads with the PLIH as they had turned down the request to induct some BPP trustees on the MC. Instead the MC inducted former BPP trustee Noshir Dadrawala and Cama, who had both opposed the Mehta-WAPIZ combine in the 2008 and 2009 BPP trusteeship elections.

The PLIH property is owned by the BPP but the management of the Hospital is in the hands of the MC. Legal luminary and present advocate general of Maharashtra Darius Khambata has opined that according to the PLIH trust deed, the BPP is duty bound to carry out the dictates of the MC.

After lengthy discussions and various alternate proposals and exchange of correspondence between the warring factions, the BPP has been unable to match the monetary offer made by Krimson for use of the property. At the same time they are unwilling to sanction the Krimson scheme. The prolonged stalemate is now headed for the courts, adding to the BPP’s never ending docket of legal suits.

According to a member of the MC the fight between the two sides may only result in the State Government being the greatest beneficiary, as the Collector may step in and re-enter upon the property of the PLIH, the lease in respect of the property having come to an end almost 20 years back. Others believe with the MC and the BPP fighting bitterly, the Charity Commissioner may appoint an administrator, states the source.

Mehta has reportedly had direct talks with the doctors of Krimson. When asked to comment on the impending litigation, Mehta declined to do so. But MC member Yezdi Bhagwagar says no meeting or talks have been held by the BPP with the MC since January 31 this year. A without prejudice meeting was held between Khambata and the BPP lawyers around May 2012 but the BPP advocates reportedly never reverted. Cama is said to have resigned opining chances of a settlement were unlikely. Hence the resort to legal proceedings.

Disclosure: One of the tenants of the PLIH is the mother of the person who runs Parsiana.