BMC orders Bandra lounge to cease operations for making alterations on the premises

The well-chronicled struggles of Zenzi Bar against the civic authorities reached a climax yesterday, when the BMC slapped another notice, this time commanding it to shut shop.

A day after MiD DAY reported about the lounge's no-objection certificate having been held back by BMC's fire department, the civic body yesterday issued a letter to the lounge asking them to shut the establishment.


The scene outside Zenzi last night

Located at Bandra's Waterfield Road, the eatery had reopened just 24 days ago after it had been forced to down shutters by the BMC last August, and ordered to demolish its extended outdoors section.
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It reopened on December 26, 2010, with a refurbished look.

However, as reported by MiD DAY earlier ('Zenzi's licence on hold, others in soup', January 11), within a few days of the revival, BMC put their renewal licence on hold for allegedly violating civic norms.

A senior official from the BMC's health department, Dr Shridhar Kubal, said, "We have asked them to shut the lounge as the chief fire officer has denied them the no-objection certificate required to run an establishment.
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After we received the notice from the fire department, we asked the management to shut the lounge.

Moreover, various alterations made by the lounge violated BMC norms which forced us to take this step."

'False allegation'

The lounge's advocate, Ashok R Pande, feels the move to be inappropriate. "We are going to approach the court for challenging BMC's actions, particularly for stopping the operation of the restaurant.
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BMC has no power to stop anyone from running the business without giving any prior intimation," he said.

Claiming the authority's grounds for shutting the lounge are baseless, Pande said, "Yes, we received the notice yesterday from the BMC's health department asking us to shut because we made some alterations on the premises. It is a false allegation and is made at the behest of some social worker.
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Last month, we had replied to a BMC notice but till date we have not received any response. Unless they respond to us, they cannot take any action."

Pande said that though the BMC collected renewal charges from the lounge, it failed to issue them the licence. "Every year, we are supposed to renew our licences for which we made an application to the BMC.

They accepted the renewal charges but we didn't receive the licence. They have not informed us why it hasn't been renewed even after we got a receipt for it."

He continued, "We applied for and received the NOC from the fire department on Jan 11. BMC went behind our back and persuaded the fire department to withdraw the certificate.
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Till date, the fire department has not informed us that our NOC has been withdrawn."

Officials say
When MiD DAY contacted an official from health department asking why Zenzi has not been issued the licence, she said, "I have not collected any charges from the establishment. They must have made the payment online. But meanwhile, because of various complaints by residents, we had to withhold their licence."

Fan Frenzy
Zenzi's troubles have generated a backlash on Facebook. Loyal patrons of the lounge are doing their bit to keep it running. They have created a community, 'Keep Zenzi Bandra Alive!' after the stringent crackdown on Bandra pubs that began two years ago.