Veil of Secrecy: An Investigative Report on Non-Compliance and Corruption in Delhi’s Housing Societies

Veil of Secrecy: An Investigative Report on Non-Compliance and Corruption in Delhi’s Housing Societies

RMN News Report Highlights:

🌐 The Office of the Registrar Cooperative Societies (RCS) has mandated that all Delhi housing societies maintain transparent, regularly updated websites to curb widespread crime and financial swindling by Management Committees.

📢 Residents can use the expanded “Clean House” editorial and advisory service to report issues such as illegal construction, corruption, and civic neglect in various residential areas across Delhi.

🤝 Evidence suggests that many Management Committees operate “hand in glove” with corrupt officials from departments like the RCS and DDA to conceal criminal acts and avoid accountability for their operations.

⚖️ Failing to establish or update a society website is legally construed as a criminal offense, potentially leading to the prosecution of committee members under the DCS Act or the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.

By Rakesh Raman
New Delhi | January 9, 2026

Introduction: The Promise Betrayed

The ideal of cooperative living in Delhi’s numerous housing societies—built on principles of community, shared responsibility, and mutual benefit—stands in stark contrast to the daily reality faced by millions of residents. Instead of secure and harmonious environments, many societies have devolved into centers of crime, corruption, and systemic harassment.

This investigative report reveals that this decay is not accidental but is a direct consequence of a profound and deliberate lack of transparency. The central thesis of this report is that the widespread failure of Management Committees (MCs) to implement mandatory transparency websites is not a simple oversight. It is a calculated strategy to conceal illicit activities, a strategy enabled and protected by a deeply entrenched system of corruption within the Registrar Cooperative Societies (RCS) office and a network of complicit government bodies.

1.0 The Mandate for Transparency: A Clear Directive Ignored

To combat the rising tide of corruption within Cooperative Group Housing Societies (CGHS), the Delhi Government’s Registrar Cooperative Societies (RCS) office established clear, legally binding directives. These mandates, centered on the creation and maintenance of a society website, represent a simple, low-cost tool designed to empower residents with information and enforce a basic standard of accountability on their elected Management Committees.

The mandate for a transparent society website has been official policy since at least 2015. The RCS office has reinforced this compulsory requirement through subsequent notifications in 2021, underscoring its legal gravity and warning of potential action against non-compliant societies. To remove any logistical barriers and facilitate adherence, the RCS even provided an online Google form for societies to submit their website addresses and other essential details.

Core Requirements for a Transparent Website

The RCS directives are specific about the information that must be published and regularly updated to ensure genuine transparency. The essential components include:

• Details of all members.
• Records of financial transactions, including all corresponding purchase documents and vouchers.
• Details of all contracts and the specific criteria used for the appointment of vendors.
• Comprehensive information on all payments made by the society.
• A complete record of all internal and external communications.
• Regular updates on the status of legal cases involving the society.
• An online form for members to register complaints, along with an official email address for communication.
• Instant and regular updates of all communications between members and the MC, ensuring a real-time record of interactions.

Crucially, compliance with this mandate carries “almost no cost,” as free software platforms are widely available for creating and maintaining such websites. This fact dismantles any argument that failure to comply is a matter of financial or technical inability, pointing instead to a deliberate refusal. The stark reality, however, is one of near-total non-compliance.

2.0 A Pattern of Willful Defiance: The Scale of Non-Compliance

Measuring compliance with the RCS mandate is a strategic necessity, as the results reveal a pattern not of logistical challenges, but of willful defiance by Management Committees across Delhi. It is estimated that a mere 5% of housing societies have a website of any kind. Furthermore, even among this tiny fraction, the websites are frequently neglected and not updated with the relevant, mandated information, rendering them useless as tools of accountability.

This widespread failure constitutes a “blatant ignoring” of legally binding orders from a government authority. The failure to create and regularly update a society website is legally defined as an “offence.” This act of non-compliance must be treated as a “criminal act” for which MC members can and should be prosecuted under the Delhi Co-operative Societies (DCS) Act and relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code (or its successor, the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023) related to fraud, cheating, and criminal conspiracy. This willful defiance is not random; it is the lynchpin in a deeply rooted criminal enterprise. The question is not just how MCs get away with it, but who in the government is helping them.

3.0 The Nexus of Corruption: Uncovering the Alliance Between MCs and Officials

The systemic failure of the transparency mandate cannot be explained by the actions of Management Committees alone. Our investigation reveals that it is facilitated by a corrupt symbiosis between housing society MCs and officials across multiple government departments. This section dissects the mechanics of this relationship, exposing a network of complicity that ensures the rules designed to promote transparency are never enforced.

This investigation confirms that corrupt MCs and officials within the RCS office operate “hand in glove.” The RCS office is considered “among the most corrupt departments in India,” where officials are “apparently bribed” by MCs to ignore non-compliance and actively conceal criminal activities. This unholy alliance effectively neutralizes the primary regulatory body responsible for oversight.

However, the corruption extends far beyond a single department. A broad network of government entities allegedly colludes with MCs, creating a protective shield for their illicit operations.

A Web of Complicity

Department / Entity	Role in Systemic Corruption
Registrar Cooperative Societies (RCS)	Allegedly accepts bribes to ignore non-compliance and close cases without action.
Delhi Development Authority (DDA)	Supports corrupt MCs in activities like unauthorized construction.
Delhi Police	Described as “perhaps the most corrupt police force in the country”; fails to take action against MCs or include their names in FIRs for serious crimes, such as deaths resulting from illegal construction accidents.
Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD)	Implicated in the network of connivance.
Other Delhi Govt. Departments	Including Delhi Jal Board (DJB), Delhi Fire Service (DFS), and Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC).
Ruling Politicians	Allegedly receive a share of bribe money collected by departments like RCS and DDA, turning a blind eye to the crimes.

With their official protection secured, these MCs are free to turn housing societies into personal fiefdoms, where financial crime and human rights abuses become the norm.

4.0 The Criminal Consequences of Opacity

The deliberate cultivation of secrecy is not a victimless administrative failure. It creates a fertile breeding ground for a wide spectrum of criminal and unethical activities that directly harm residents, violate their rights, and erode the financial and physical integrity of their communities.

Financial Crimes

Without public financial records, MCs engage in the rampant swindling of public money. This includes cheating, extortion, bribery, and the embezzlement of society funds, often through capital-intensive projects. Another lucrative scheme involves the illicit sale of multiple car parking spaces to single flat owners in exchange for substantial bribes. The corruption extends to the society staff, where common plumbers and electricians “fleece the residents by charging heavy amounts even for small tasks,” likely with MCs taking illicit commissions from these looters.

Illegal Construction and Environmental Damage

This investigation identifies the rampant Floor Area Ratio (FAR) construction as a “massive extortion racket” run by MCs in collusion with the DDA and RCS. In occupied societies, this activity subjects thousands of residents, including children and senior citizens, to severe and prolonged dust and noise pollution. This unauthorized construction frequently leads to serious accidents, including deaths, and causes significant environmental damage, all while generating illicit profits for the perpetrators.

Abuse of Power and Human Rights Violations

The lack of accountability allows MCs to entrench their power indefinitely through fraudulent elections, enabling the same members to simply rotate posts for decades. This unchecked power manifests in daily persecution, from tolerating “ferocious dogs” that spread filth and disturb residents, to allowing “untamed flat owners” to engage in constant, disruptive construction, turning residential buildings into “war-torn regions.” This authority also leads to illegal surveillance of residents, intimidation of those who voice dissent, and widespread human rights violations.

The failure of the institutions meant to provide justice only deepens the crisis, leaving residents with no formal recourse against these escalating crimes.

5.0 Systemic Failure: The Collapse of Accountability Mechanisms

The persistence of crime and corruption in Delhi’s housing societies is guaranteed by the comprehensive breakdown of official grievance and judicial mechanisms. Residents who attempt to seek justice through formal channels find themselves navigating a system that is either indifferent, inefficient, or actively complicit. This systemic collapse leaves them with virtually no effective recourse.

The ineffectiveness of established channels is stark:

• RCS Inquiries: These are characterized as “perfunctory.” When complaints are filed, the RCS may issue casual notices, but the subsequent inquiries are superficial. Cases are routinely closed without providing any relief to the complainant, a failure attributed to MCs bribing RCS officials to secure favorable outcomes.
• Judicial System: The courts are described as “overcrowded” and the judicial system as “inefficient.” This results in inordinately delayed or unjust decisions, rendering the legal path unviable for most residents seeking timely intervention.
• Online Grievance Systems (PGMS): Public grievance portals, such as the Delhi Government’s PGMS, are managed by the very same corrupt officials who are part of the problem. Consequently, they close cases without taking any meaningful action or providing relief.
• Delhi Police: The police force consistently fails to take action on resident complaints, even in cases involving serious crimes like deaths resulting from illegal FAR construction. Reports indicate they deliberately omit the names of culpable MC members from First Information Reports (FIRs).

In response to this institutional vacuum, a citizen-focused alternative has emerged. The “Clean House“ service, run by RMN News, functions as a “community court” to address these failures. It is important to note that the “Clean House” service “does not provide legal or government support,” positioning itself strictly as a “journalistic and public awareness mechanism” to exert institutional pressure where official channels have failed. This initiative underscores the complete failure of the state’s own systems and the desperate need for comprehensive reform.

6.0 Conclusion: A Call for Radical Reform

This investigation concludes that the pervasive non-compliance with the transparency website mandate is not a series of isolated failures but a deliberate and systemic feature of a deeply corrupt ecosystem. This system, built on a criminal alliance between the Management Committees of housing societies and a broad network of government officials, thrives on opacity to facilitate financial fraud, human rights abuses, and environmental crime.

This crisis in Delhi’s housing societies is a symptom of a larger malignancy. Delhi is described as the “corruption capital of India,” a claim substantiated by ongoing high-level corruption investigations against 10 senior IAS officers and even a judge. This endemic corruption is meticulously documented in reports such as the ‘India Judicial Research Report 2025 – Decline of the Indian Judiciary‘ and the ‘India Corruption Research Report 2025,’ which paint a grim picture of systemic failure. The existing mechanisms of governance and justice have utterly failed. To reclaim the promise of cooperative living and protect the rights of millions of residents, nothing short of radical and immediate reform is required.

The following actions are imperative:

1. Enforce Accountability: The government must immediately demand the prosecution of non-compliant MC members under the DCS Act and relevant criminal codes for their willful defiance of the law.
2. Institutional Reform: A complete and transparent revamp of the RCS office is non-negotiable. This must include the creation of an effective online portal on the RCS website itself, allowing residents to file complaints directly against corrupt officials within the department.
3. Drastic Measures: The scale of the corruption demands severe deterrents. This investigation highlights a call for a “separate jail” to be built specifically for corrupt MC members and the bureaucrats who enable them.
4. International Intervention: Given the categorical failure of India’s judicial forums to provide justice, there is a clear call for intervention from international human rights and law-enforcement agencies to protect the fundamental rights and lives of residents trapped in this lawless environment.

By Rakesh Raman, who is a national award-winning journalist and social activist. He is the founder of a humanitarian organization RMN Foundation which is working in diverse areas to help the disadvantaged and distressed people in the society.