Officials from BMC's storm water drain (SWD) department said that the new development is a set back for the Mahul project, which has been pending for years due to a land dispute between the salt commissioner, an entity of the Union government, and the BMC. (File) The BMC’s proposed storm water drain pumping station at Mahul has once again hit the roadblock, as land offered by the civic body to the private developer in exchange for the project was marked as “No-Development Zone” (NDZ) in the latest approved maps of the Coastal Zone Management Plan (CZMP) of Mumbai.
The BMC has put on hold the tendering process for the construction of the Rs 350-crore pumping station, as the developer is not ready to accept the plot offered by it.
The construction of Mahul pumping station, which will be the eighth one in Mumbai, will help in solving waterlogging issues in areas like Gandhi Market in Matunga, Kings Circle, Sindhi Society, Nehru Nagar in Kurla, officials from the BMC said.
Officials from BMC’s storm water drain (SWD) department said that the new development is a set back for the Mahul project, which has been pending for years due to a land dispute between the salt commissioner, an entity of the Union government, and the BMC.
Officials from BMC’s development plan (DP) department came to know about the NDZ issue after the final maps of CZMP for Mumbai City and Mumbai Suburban 2019 was made available February last week. Subsequently, the developer also approached the BMC and refused to accept the land offered.
Last November, the BMC improvement committee had approved the land exchange between Ajmera Realty And Infrastructure India Limited and the civic body for the pumping station. As per the agreement, the BMC agreed to give a 13,390 sq m plot to the developer reserved as recreational ground, along with transfer of development right (TDR). In exchange, Ajmera Realty would hand over the plot owned by it for construction of the pumping station.
After the proposal was passed in BMC general body meeting, last December, the SWD department floated a tender for appointing a company to construct the pumping station at an estimated cost of Rs 350 crore. The BMC had set a deadline of 24 months for the project.
“In the current scenario, we can’t go ahead with the project. We are exploring other options like acquiring land under the Disaster Management Act, as the project is essential to tackle the city’s flooding issues,” said P Velrasu, additional municipal commissioner (Projects).
As the land finalised by the BMC for the pumping station was falling in the jurisdiction of the salt commissioner, the issue was raised multiple times but the salt department did not respond. Even Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray had taken up the issue with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2020.
Since the dispute was not resolved, the BMC appointed a technical consultant to conduct another land survey in the area. It found a land parcel owned by Ajmera suitable for the station.
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