IE : City Development Plan proposed for revision : Aug 28, 2007

T he Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) wants to work on the Mumbai
Devel opment Plan (DP) seven years in advance to prevent delays. The last
time the plan was sanctioned in parts was from 1990 to 1994. Although, as
per the clause in the Maharashtra Regional Town Planning (MRTP), the
revision of the plan was to come up in 2014, twenty years after the plan was
last revised, the city planners are already mulling over revising the plan.
A proposal initiating the revision has been floated by the BMC and is due to
be placed before the Improvements Commit tee and subsequently the General
Body for their sanction. The move was initiated after a directive was given
to the state government by the Bombay High Court following a Public Interest
Litigation (PIL), which criticised the amount of time that preparation and
sanctioning procedure had taken earlier.

“The entire procedure will take a few months to kick off after which we will
have to approach the Urban Development Ministry to appoint a town planning
officer. After the appointment, a notice of intention to revise the DP will
be published after which the actual process will kick off,” explained Ashok
Shintre, Chief Engineer, Development Plan. The plan involves an elaborate
procedure of carry ing out an entire land use survey, preparing relevant
maps, preparing new proposals, inviting suggestions and objections from the
public and finally getting a final sanction from the government.

The first and very important step in the process is conducting a fresh land
use survey, updating the database and preparing a map. In the process, the
entire land area is physically visited with existing DP plan and the
reservations are checked. “This helps us get the real picture on what a
certain reservation is being used for – whether it needs to be acquired, if
it is encroached, what is to be done next, and in certain cases if we need
the reservation removed then we initiate such suggestions,” said Shintre.
Apart from the survey, there will also be several studies conducted like
socio-economic studies, transportation studies; envi ronmental status
studies which are vital when new proposals are being made. The changes
proposed in these studies will then form an integral part of the revised
proposed draft DP which after inviting suggestions and objections from the
public will stand for final sanction from the state government.

Shintre added that anticipating the socio-economic and spatial changes in
the city’s development the BMC will also consider new reservations which
will lead to effective urban management that promotes investment and
facilitates stakeholder involvement. “We are considering reservations for
the power sector for setting up sub-stations or power stations which are the
need of tomorrow,” he said.