Cuffe Parade or Versova, same problem on seafront: Encroachments
In a city where 60 pc of the population lives in slums, no one’s sure when
the encroachments on beaches will go
KAVITHA IYER
CUFFE Parade and Versova may be at two opposite ends of the city, but a
long-standing predicament brings them together- dense encroachments on the
seafront. Also common: No solution in sight for either.
Sagar Kutir, an 8,000shanty strong slum, occupies a sizeable portion of
golden sand. Like Ganesh Murti Nagar and Ambedkar Nagar at Cuffe Parade,
Sagar Kutir’s residents are mostly protected, having resided on the beach
before 1995. Photojournalist and Versova resident Rajesh Vora, a member of
the Save Versova Beach Association that has undertaken several initiatives
to beautify their 2-km-long sandy stretch including fencing of the mangroves
and cleanliness drives, says it would be wishful thinking to expect early
solutions, even though they’ve been struggling for over a decade.
“We’re meeting the collector’s representatives soon,” he said. “We’re hopeful that
something will work out.” Versova’s residents and activists have taken a
rather pragmatic view of the prob lem-Sagar Kutir can’t be wished away, and
in any case its residents comprise a significant workforce of drivers,
domestic help, autorickshawdrivers, handcart pullers and vendors of various
goods. “We would like them to be rehabilitated somewhere in the vicinity,”
said Vora. Since in-situ rehabilitation is ruled out, the stakeholders are
hoping the government will find a suitable plot.
The methi cultivation along Versova beach and the wells dug by the slumdwellers are hardly ecological best practices, residents point out, not to mention the open-air toilet the
shoreline turns into each morning.
Post-monsoon, Sagar Kutir will also see construction work begin for a
terminal and jetty for the inland water transport project, through which a
contractor will operate high-end ferry services from Borivali to Nariman
Point, with a halt at Versova. “Certainly, encroachments in the area will
have to go,” said a senior official of the Maharashtra State Road De
velopment Corporation (MSRDC), which has signed an agreement with the opera
tor. But MSRDC too puts the onus on finding a rehabil itation plot on the
suburban collector’s office.
“Name the problem and it was solved at Girgaum Chowpatty,” says Indrani
Malkani, one of the mem bers of the high court-ap pointed committee that
over sees the development of the beach-easily the city’s best maintained
seafront Only last Thursday, the High Court pulled up agencies for granting
a liquor licence to a restaurant in what is ostensibly a water sports
complex at Girgaum.
“How can you have a part of the beach or promenade fenced off and closed to
pub lic?” Malkani asks. “A prece dent has been set. Municipal authorities
are now aware of the requirements of main taining a beach. Instead of a
parallel system, citizens must activate the existing system and make it
work.”
There are other, much smaller seafronts that have encroachments too,
but civic officials say the problem needs to be addressed by the collector’s
office-beaches are state government prop erty, the BMC merely con ducts
demolition drives when asked to. And, as long as no body complains that a
new shanty has been erected, no body stops the new residents on the city’s
beaches either.
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