More land sought at Aarey colony, now for Metro 6

MMRDA raises a request for additional 29,869 sq ft land for a site office, a labour camp and a casting yard for the Andheri-Kanjurmarg Metro-6 line.

The state government is not done eating away at Aarey yet.

After the state-government controlled Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation took away 82 hectares of Aarey – equivalent to nine Oval maidans – for an administrative building, a casting yard, and a car shed for Cuffe Parade-Seepz Metro 3, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) has now raised a request for an additional 29,869 sq ft of land. The MMRDA wants the land for a site office, a labour camp and a casting yard for the Andheri-Kanjurmarg Metro-6 line.

The latest request from MMRDA is in line with environment activists’ fears that land for the Metro 3 card shed, granted in 2014 in the face of widespread protests, was just the beginning of the end of Aarey. “There will be requests for more land. And before we know it, whole of Aarey will be gone,” said an activist who did not wish to be identified.

Read also: Cutting Aarey trees can lead to floods at airport in heavy rain

Mumbai Mirror is in possession of a letter written by MMRDA Additional Commissioner Sonia Sethi to the Dairy Development Secretary Anoop Kumar on July 3. The letter says that since Metro lines have been declared “priority projects” by the state government, the land will have to be transferred urgently. Though the letter says the 29,869 sq ft land near the Jogeshwari-Vikhroli Link road is being acquired on a temporary basis, at another place it says land acquisition for the project is being carried out on “both temporary and permanent basis.”

Sethi did not respond to questions sent to her by this newspaper, while Project Manager D K Sharma said he was in no position to comment. Secretary, Dairy Development, Anoop Kumar, described the letter as an “internal communication” and refused comment.


MMRDA’s decision to cut 2,702 Aarey trees to make way for a card shed for Metro 3 has led to protests across the city. The cutting of trees was approved by BMC’s Tree Authority without any debate last week, leading to two tree experts’ resignations.

Green activist Zoru Bhathena, who moved the Bombay High Court against the plan to cut trees at Aarey, said the MMRDA’s demand for more land has not come as a surprise to him. “It is this government’s game plan to develop Aarey as the next BKC,” he said.

Amrita Bhattacharjee, who has been at the forefront of the Save Aarey campaign, said a mode of transport cannot be developed at the cost of the environment. “The government must stop further destruction of city’s natural holding ponds. In a coastal city, these holding ponds play a vital role in preventing flooding in heavy rains,” she said.

A senior Aarey colony officer, who did not wish to be named, said it is still not clear which land parcel MMRDA wants. “We received this letter from our superiors about three weeks back. We had called the MMRDA for a joint inspection of land. But they did not turn up,’’ he said.

The 14.47 km Lokhandwala-Jogeshwari-Vikhroli-Kanjurmarg Metro 6 corridor will have 13 stations and cost Rs 6,672 crore. It is to be an elevated corridor.