Mhada’s 3rd tender for Abhyudaya Nagar redevelopment draws 3 bids

Three developers express interest in redeveloping Abhyudaya Nagar after reduced housing area and incentives for residents, aiming to overcome previous failures.

Mumbai: After two failed attempts, Abhyudaya Nagar at Kalachowki might finally be redeveloped as three developers have shown interest in the third tender floated by the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (Mhada).

Mhada’s 3rd tender for Abhyudaya Nagar redevelopment draws 3 bids

The tender, floated under the the Construction and Development Agency model expects a response from developers who are willing to bear the entire cost of rehabilitating the existing inhabitants. The developers will have to provide amenities as well as infrastructure to the current residents and then build saleable homes to recover the cost of the development and make a profit.

As per Mhada, the three interested developers are Oberoi Realty, Mahindra Lifespaces and MGN Agro Properties. MGN Agro Properties is related to Welspun Enterprises and Welspun Corp, an infrastructure developer focused on developing and operating roads, highways, water infrastructure projects, and wastewater systems.

A Mhada official said that the authority is currently analysing the technical eligibility of the bidders, and next week they will look at the financial aspect of the redevelopment and check how much the developers have quoted for the project.

The three responses to Mhada’s third tender came only after the carpet area (the total usable floor area within a property) to be offered to the existing residents was significantly reduced. Initially, each homeowner was promised 740 sq.ft residences, but that space was cut down to 635 sq.ft due to the lack of interest from real estate private players. Despite this, no private developer showed interest in the area, and in April the state government further reduced the carpet area to 620 sq.ft.

In addition to the 620 sq.ft redeveloped apartments, the appointed builder will also have to pay every flat owner a corpus of ₹5 lakh along with a ₹20,000 monthly rent and a four-wheeler parking slot. At present, each single room housing unit in Abhyudaya Nagar takes up 208 sq ft.

On March 7 in the legislative assembly, chief minister Devendra Fadnavis explained that the reduction in the carpet area as well as the premium that the developer had to pay to Mhada was aimed at making the project feasible and allowing the redevelopment to take off.

The earlier tenders were floated by Mhada on XXX and XXX (dates).