Not – in – my – b a c k y a rd

Mumbai: After two years of legal battle and series of protests, the Maharashtra government has decided to finally act on the long-pending proposal to close down the Gorai dumping ground and relocate it to Kanjurmarg.
The urban development department, headed by chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, has decided to withdraw an earlier application filed in the court to have the dumping ground shifted to Mulund instead of Kanjurmarg.
“A decision has been finalised to shift from Gorai and that the ideal location for a dumping ground would be Kanjurmarg where a 141-hectare salt pan plot is to be used for disposal of solid waste,’’ a top DF functionary said.
Though the Supreme Court had in 2003 directed the state to shift to Kanjurmarg as the 15-hectare Gorai dumping ground had exhausted its capacity, the Central and the state governments had filed a modified application urging the court to allow them to shift to Mulund.
The modification was insisted upon by the Union urban development ministry as it was not eager to hand over the 141-hectare salt lands at Kanjurmarg.
However, the move had sparked off street protests in Mulund with residents declaring their resistance to any such proposal. “It was a difficult task to have a dumping ground in Mulund which is so densely inhabited. The best choice was at Kanjurmarg which is far away from residential areas,’’ a civic official told TOI.
All the dumping grounds in the city are bursting at their seams with nearly 7,000 metric tonnes of garbage generated daily. Moreover, with locals opposing any new proposal for creating garbage grounds in their neighbourhood, the civic administration was rendered helpless.
The latest to join the ‘ n o t – i n – my – b a c k y a rd ’ brigade was Sardar Tara Singh (BJP MLA from Mulund) who opposed the proposal to convert a 42-acre salt pan land on the Mulund-Airoli link road into a landfill site.
“Mulund was not the best site as there were issues of land reservations, long lease agreements etc. and it would take months before the process for dereservation, cancelling lease agreement could yield any result. In such a situation Kanjurmarg was the best spot as the entire land belonged to the salt commissioner and it would only require the Centre’s sanction for its utilisation as a dumping ground.’’ the official said.