TOI: Big bucks needed to green city: January 13, 2011

Big bucks needed to green city……..Sharad Vyas
Rs 93,500 Cr May Be The Bill To Free Reserved Spaces Of Squatters: Study

Mumbai: The civic body could have to pay as much as Rs 93,500 crore to free encroached open spaces that have not yet been acquired or developed,according to a new study.The study,by a BMC engineer in the Development Plan (DP) department,states that around 8.26 lakh tenements would have to be built to house encroachers removed from such lands and the government might be faced with using only the costly Land Acquisition (LA) Act to do the job.

The study focuses on six municipal wards in Mumbai three with lower slum density and three with higher.It found that as much as 81% of land reserved for open space that had not yet been acquired or developed had been encroached.Wards C,HWest and T (low slum density) and G-North,P-North and L (higher slum density) had a total of 52.53 lakh square metres of reserved open space yet to be acquired or developed.Of this,42.55 lakh square metres had been encroached.

By extending these findings to all of Mumbais wards,in which 4.975 crore square metres of land has been reserved for open spaces,the study says around 3.06 crore square metres of reserved open space is yet to be acquired or developed and 2.48 crore square metres of this must be encroached.At an average of 30 square metres per slum tenement,around 8.26 lakh alternate accommodations might have to be built.This is a huge investment on the part of the BMC in terms of making available land and money, says the study,conducted under the guidance of faculty at CEPT University,Ahmedabad.

The study points out that the LA Act would have to be used to acquire encroached plots as the Slum Rehabilitation Authority (SRA) scheme has been stayed by the Bombay High Court for reserved open plots.The other tool used to acquire reserved open spaces,Transfer of Development Rights (TDR),cannot be applied as free of encumbrances is the prerequisite for any TDR proposal.Of late,giving away TDR has become the cashstrapped BMCs favoured method of acquiring reserved spaces.

Not impressed with the existing,archaic land acquisition tools LA,TDR and SRA the study urges the BMC to adopt new methods to develop open spaces in a city that offers a paltry 2 square metres to every individual going by the 2001 Census.

The paper recommends offering higher Floor Space Index (FSI) to private landowners,who could offer the BMC built-up tenements for rehabilitation in return.These could be used to temporarily rehabilitate people on a rental basis,the study says.The alternate accommodation could be handed over to the BMC free of cost and kept under appropriate administrative control and have separate accesses and entrances from the rest of the private construction, the report says.

The archaic LA Act puts the onus of rehabilitating squatters on the BMC.Last month,the BMC paid Rs 3.3 crore for a 1,054 squaremetre plot in Vile Parle that housed 19-odd structures (a legally declared slum) that took up 40% of the total open space available.The original owner had bought the land,which was reserved for a playground and housing for the poor,for Rs 60 lakh in 2008.

THE RECOMMENDATIONS
* BMC,with help from state,must frame policy for rental housing for those displaced from open spaces

* A panel of NGOs,experts and trusts must study,secure and maintin open spaces

* Research wings should be set up in BMC and other institutes to find out what people want from open spaces

* A cap must be placed on eligibility of slum dwellers

* Satellite and remote-sensing mapping of slums on open spaces must be carried out soon

– Image shows an open space (green) reserved in L Ward (Kurla area) where almost the entire area has been encroached

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