Foreign tenants? Stony looks in tony Mumbai

not letting out homes to foreign nationals.

When urgent personal work brought 36-year-old Alex Lutostanska,creative director of a London-based event management firm,to Mumbai on short notice,she was relieved to find paying guest accommodation at a Matunga apartment through a friend. A week into her stay there,the Pune blast took place and she was curtly told to pack her bags.

“Even when I was staying there,they were unfriendly and suspicious of me. Immediately after the blast,I was asked to leave the house and contact my high commission. They said that they were concerned about their safety and mine,” said Lutostanska who says that had her safety been of real concern,her landlady wouldn’t have thrown her belongings out of her room even before she could arrange an alternate accommodation.

The seeds of this new fear were sown ever since word got out that American national and terror suspect David Headley stayed as a paying guest in the Shyam Nivas Co-operative Housing Society in Breach Candy during 2007-08. The society,which had no clue about Headley living under their roof,has had a notice for three months now,asking members to inform the society if they have any guest of foreign or Indian nationality or even a relative who has come over.

Though Shyam Nivas has not imposed any blanket ban on foreigners,there is general panic in societies in Breach Candy,Napean Sea Road,Cuffe Parade and Colaba where foreigners are being barred.

Cuffe Castle,an upmarket housing society in Cuffe Parade,has asked its members not to rent their homes to foreigners anymore. When the lease of a foreign couple living in a two-bedroom apartment in the building got over a month ago,the landlord had to scout for Indians.

Indrani Malkani from the Malabar Hill Residents Association said that three months ago a housing society in her area lodged a police complaint against a member who had not registered their French paying guests with the police. “You never know what the person’s antecedents are even if he or she has been referred by someone known to you. Today,it is natural for everyone to be alert and exercise extreme caution,” Malkani said.

Several brokers said that while landlords do not mind letting out their homes to foreigners coming through consulates or multinational companies,those searching for a home on their own are not welcome.

“Most landlords have their biases. It is mostly against tenants who are Muslims,non-vegetarians,single women, bachelors. Recently this intolerance and exclusion has extended to foreigners too,” said broker Yashwant Dalal who is president of the Estate Agents Association of India.