Pilot Courts: Flats turn battleground as ‘guests’ manhandle RWA members
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Pilot Courts: Flats turn battleground as ‘guests’ manhandle RWA members

Ruckus, loud music, drinking, drugs and slanging matches have become routine on weekends in Pilot Courts. On Friday, ‘guests’ beat up residents and security guards when they questioned indecent behaviour and loud parties.

Pilot Courts: Flats turn battleground as ‘guests’ manhandle RWA members

This high-profile and high-end residential complex, Essel Tower, which also houses Pilot Courts, was the scene of a full-fledged fight between owners and tenants, and guests on Friday. This has the entire colony living in fear.

Scuffles, fisticuffs and slanging matches between the residents and the tenants and guests took place on Friday, which was the culmination of tension between the two sides for a long time. Essel Tower houses Pilot Courts, which has 245 flats. Out of these, 125 are either rented out or are being run as guesthouses or paying guest accommodations.

Several times, the owner residents of the flats had running battles with the tenants and guests over their loud parties, music, drinking and ugly behaviour. All this was building up, and on Friday it exploded into a serious brawl.

Pilot Courts is a society where Air India pilots had bought flats, and thus it came to be known as "Pilot’s Courts". Half of the owners don’t live there but have rented flats out to high-paying individuals.

The people who have rented out the flats or those living in paying guest accommodations find the rules of the society stifling. The owners want to lead a peaceful life. But there is clash of culture, as also of generations, that has disturbed peace in the colony.

“On Friday, I could see the fight. I saw our management committee member Captain SP Sinha being pushed. But by the time I got my phone to record the incident, he was pushed to the other side. I even requested them not to make noise, as my child was running a temperature of 104 degrees, but nothing worked," said Rashmi Kadyan, a resident of Block A.

Playing of loud music, drinking, breaking of glasses and hooting have become routine on weekends. On Friday, the brawl became ugly with the guests fighting with security guards, management committee members and residents.

Captain SP Sinha, management committee member, said, “Even the guards were threatened, and they kept creating a ruckus.”

A retired top police official, Raj Kadyan (Retd) DIG, said he was a witness to the crowd of young people who were “manhandling us”.

Anu Randhawa, an ex-journalist and now a resident of Block H, said, “Our block is 30-40 yards away from the main gate and still we could hear people laughing, shouting and breaking glasses. We don't pay maintenance to live in an insecure society.”

She added, “I have two daughters and feel scared to send them out of the flat alone. With used condoms on stairs and other places, our patience has now given way. With drunk men in lifts, I fear to send my daughters alone. My husband is a pilot and hence I am alone so many days with my girls. I expect to be protected, which currently I don't feel at all.”

On Saturday, the day after the brawl, the association called a meeting, where RWA president Rajiv Sinha and Captain SP Sinha from Pilot Courts met and discussed the issue. “We decided to work together to solve the problem. First, draft rules will be formed that all sides must respect,” he said.

The residents, meanwhile, are feeling insecure inside their own societies. “There are drugs in lawns, and liquor bottles on roofs - the society is not conducive to good living these days,” said another resident.

Sandeep Khirwar, police commissioner, Gurgaon, told City Spidey that “we have not received any complaints. We can act and investigate only if there is a complaint, which neither of the parties have filed.”