Plan to resettle Dharavi residents at Dahisar dropped following local opposition

MUMBAI: Under pressure from Dahisar residents, the state government has cancelled its plans of relocating the ineligible tenants of the Dharavi slums at the Dahisar octroi naka depot. On Thursday, the BMC issued a tender to construct a ₹1,400-crore inter-state bus terminal (ISBT), a commercial complex and a 107-bed hotel on the plot, as the BJP has been opposing the shifting of Dharavi’s slum dwellers to Dahisar.
The 18,500-square-metre plot once housed a BMC octroi naka, a place where octroi tax was collected from people bringing goods into Mumbai. The place fell vacant after the BMC discontinued octroi, and was recently identified as one of the places to resettle post-2000 residents of Dharavi, who are not entitled to houses in situ.
Along with Dahisar, BMC and government-owned plots at Mulund, Wadala and Kurla were chosen to resettle Dharavi residents. All these were opposed by locals who did not want slum dwellers in their vicinity. Due to this opposition, the ruling parties, including the BJP, not just developed cold feet but actively opposed the project.
“We did not want people from Dharavi,” said Manisha Chaudhari, the BJP MLA from Dahisar. “When I learnt about this move, I complained to my higher-ups and various officials. I demanded that the land be used for an inter-state bus terminal instead. At present, all outstation buses are parked on the internal roads of Dahisar and Borivali. If there is an ISBT, the whole outstation transport business will become disciplined. The BMC will also earn revenue from giving parking space to private buses.’’
Chaudhari added that even North Mumbai MP Piyush Goyal, accompanied by local BJP units, took up the issue of an ISBT in a meeting with municipal commissioner Bhushan Gagrani last week. “The earlier municipal commissioner I S Chahal had promised me that he would set up an ISBT here when I had apprised him of our traffic woes,” she said. “This plot is on the edge of Mumbai and is connected by the metro to Mumbai as well as the Mira-Bhayander proposed metro.”
The BMC’s executive engineer Pritam Satardekar said that the ISBT would have parking for 450 outstation buses and 1,700 cars, an office complex and a hotel of 107 rooms. It will cost ₹1,400 crore and will take four years to complete,” he said.
The Shiv Sena led by Uddhav Thackeray and the Congress have already objected to the doling out of BMC lands to housing departments for resettling the ineligible tenants of Dharavi.
The DRPPL and state housing department are currently doing a survey of slum dwellers of Dharavi. At present, residents who have constructed hutments till 2000 will get free houses. Only ground-floor houses will be included in the scheme, and the rest will be accommodated in the rental housing schemes of the state government at Bhandup, Kanjurmarg and Deonar.
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Unwelcome everywhere
Plans to construct rental housing for the Dharavi slum dwellers in Mulund, Kurla Dairy and Wadala have also been met with opposition.
In Mulund, BJP leader Kirit Somaiya organised several protests while in Kurla, the Shiv Sena’s local MLA Mangesh Kudalkar vehemently opposed the government’s handing over of the Kurla Dairy land. Several morchas have been organised against this by locals who do not want 900 trees on the site to be cut and want a botanical park there instead.
Some housing societies at Bhakti Park have opposed the plans to construct rental housing on the Wadala salt pan lands but their voices are relatively feeble. The state is keen on having rental housing at Wadala because it is close to Dharavi.