Mill heartland protests stadium
Mumbai: As a youngster, Nilesh Nakashe (29) liked his daily ritual of two-stumps-no-bails cricket at the Godrej Ground, officially called Manoranjan Maidan. He valued the freedom to walk out on his team after a dicey LBW and join others playing football instead. Occasionally, Nakashe lined up for kabaddi too, at this playground east of Currey Road railway station.
Nakashe didn’t grow up to be the next Sachin , nevertheless, he cherishes the memories this open space offered. His children might not grow up with such memories though. The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), which owns the 97,295.31 sq ft-plot in Central Mumbai, is planning to turn it into a 1,000-seater stadium.
And while the 57,899.07 sq ft-playing field might hardly seem amiss, space earmarked for four-wheeler parking in one corner of the BMC plan is raising fears of restrictive entry and eventual exclusion.
‘‘Once a stadium comes up, they will start charging for entry. Gradually, it will be handed over to a private club that will fortify it by building a club house and this, the locals can obviously not afford,’’ says Bhaskar Sawant of the Maidan Bachav Samiti, which along with local residents’ forums is opposing the stadium.
‘‘We see these big towers coming up everywhere and we know who this stadium will cater to. It’s clearly not us,’’ explains Nakashe.
In Mumbai’s erstwhile mill heartland that’s witnessing a construction boom since the last few years, the rapidly changing social profile of its neighbourhood has not gone unnoticed.
‘‘People here don’t need air-conditioned fancy gymnasiums, they travel long distances by public transport—that exercise is good enough,’’ roars Sawant, who is convinced that Godrej isn’t a one-off and open ground tacitly turn into private premises, with locals always ignored. ‘‘An open ground should remain an open space,’’ he insists.
Since the time the proposal was mooted in May 2005 and Rs 1.6 crore approved, residents have been writing to the BMC and even invoked the Right to Information to cull details.
What further raised concerns was the BMC’s decision to rent out the field to a private body, South Central Mumbai Sports Club, from April 15 to May 30 last year.
‘‘Why can’t they discuss plans with us? What are we supposed to do once the big club comes in, guide their posh cars ?’’ asks Shashikant Phansekar, mocking at a taxi struggling to make its way past the narrow path leading to the ground.
Thirty per cent of the ground was turned into a dump last year, in what the locals believe were implicit means to keep them away from the field.
While BMC’s F-South Assistant Municipal Commissioner V Patvardhan concedes that preliminary work like soil-testing has been undertaken, he rules out a club moving in.
‘‘Right now, there’s no club in the picture, but we may let others take care of the maintenance later,’’ he admits.
Officials from the civic Gardens Department also brush off suspicions. ‘‘We have planned a jogging track and a cricket field. And it’s definitely for the locals,’’ says a civic official.
But Nakashe is not convinced. Staring up at high-rises all around, it is tough to stay grounded in this reality, he reckons.
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