BMC should be planning authority on slums on civic land: Gagrani

Mumbai's municipal commissioner demands BMC be designated as planning authority for slums on its land, amid ongoing disputes with the Slum Rehabilitation Authority.

MUMBAI: The city’s municipal commissioner Bhushan Gagrani has written to the state urban development department (UDD), demanding that the BMC be made a planning authority for slums on BMC land. The civic body has been having differences with the Slum Rehabilitation Authority (SRA) on this for the past few months.

BMC should be planning authority on slums on civic land: Gagrani

In the letter sent on November 28, Gagrani asked the UDD to give appropriate directions to appoint the BMC as the Special Planning Authority for the development of slums on 64 BMC plots and all other slum rehabilitation schemes on BMC lands except the ongoing slum rehabilitation schemes.

The civic chief also referred to a government resolution (GR) issued by the housing department which stated that the government had sanctioned the implementation of pending/stalled slum rehabilitation in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region by various authorities such as the BMC, MHADA and CIDCO on a joint venture basis with the SRA. ‘It appears that the said notification has been issued by the housing department without considering the letter of the BMC dated July 5, 2024 and without consultation with UDD,’ says Gagrani’s letter. ‘Therefore, as stated in the earlier letter, it would be appropriate to appoint the BMC as the Planning Authority for the redevelopment of slums on BMC lands for the reasons mentioned therein instead of developing such a scheme.’

Rama Mitkar, deputy chief engineer of the SRA, did not respond to messages or calls from this paper.

Gagrani has written to the SRA on a couple of earlier occasions. In September he sent the Authority a letter, asking it not to interfere in projects on BMC land as a planning authority. The chief engineer of the Development Plan department, Sunil Rathod, had then written to the assistant commissioners of all BMC wards to not issue any NOC or Annexure for SRA projects under Regulation 33 (12) of Development Control Promotional Regulations, 2034.

Rathod said that Gagrani had written to the CEO of SRA that issuing permission under the various regulations which were beyond the SRA’s jurisdiction and combining them with other regulations was a violation of the provisions of the Maharashtra Regional Town Planning Act, 1966 as well as a violation of DCPR-2034. He requested directions to the concerned SRA officials to immediately take action and stop issuing such permissions and also directed that permissions which had already been granted be withdrawn to avoid legal complications in future.

An SRA senior official, when questioned, retorted that the decision to have SRA as the planning authority had been taken by the state cabinet, and it could not be changed “by writing letters”.