BMC plans child-friendly offices
Will Make It Mandatory To Provide Day-Care Centres If Number Of Female Employees Is Over 500
Mumbai: Working mothers in the city can now be assured in the knowledge that their children are safe while they toil hard in offices. The BMC will make it mandatory for new institutional, business or mercantile and industrial buildings to provide a creche—or a day-care centre for children—if the total number of female employees is 500 or more in the building.
The civic body plans to amend the Development Control Regulations (DCR) to allow the construction of a creche of minimum 20 sq m built-up area and, possibly, free of floor space index (FSI) to encourage builders to make it part of the construction.
To finalise the modalities of its implementation, the civic Improvements Committee will discuss the proposal on Wednesday. If successful, the scheme could be applied to include new shopping malls and upcoming residential constructions.
“We realised that with the city’s economic growth more and more women are travelling to south Mumbai for employment and it would be helpful for them if they have creches in their office buildings,’’ said a senior official from the civic development plan department.
Before the plan becomes part of the DP guidelines, the civic officials have invited suggestions and objections for consideration. In his letter to the BMC, R P Athalye, deputy director, town planning, said the proposal would only work if workplace is near the employee’s residence. “In a city where working women find it difficult to board even the local trains, how can one expect employees to carry their children in such a crowded trains?’’ Athalye said.
While working on the implementation policy of the plan, the civic officials would also consider other factors, such as who would run the facility, medical facility to be provided and provision of maid servants.
However innovative the idea, officials say it would be difficult to verify the correct number of women in a building during the approval of a plan. “We will ask the government to allow construction of creche on the basis of the built-up area of the building and not the number of female employees,’’ said the official.
Developers and mall owners have welcomed the proposal but said it would expose mall operators, owners and developers, to greater risks in the absence of proper regulatory framework to implement the plan.
“It is a fantastic proposition but the BMC needs to understand that it is a highly specialised task they are talking about. It would be challenging for them to implement it,’’ said Sanjay Dutt of Cushman & Wakefield, a leading property consultant.