Newlinkroad's Blog

Threat To City’s Mangroves Draft Marks Commercial Areas On High Tide Line

The draft Development Plan 2034 is not only filled with errors and significant omissions, but has also proposed regularization of encroachments in the eco-sensitive coastal regulation zone-1 (CRZ-1) areas. Most of Mumbai’s CRZ-1 areas have a massive growth of mangroves which protect the coast from erosion.

Mangroves have been declared as forests by the state government.

The encroachments, which have come up over the past decade by destroying mangroves and reclaiming land, are being sought to be legitimized through the Development Plan, alleged the New Link Road Residents’ Association. These encroachments have even been highlighted by the mangrove cell in its report filed in the Bombay high court in a PIL filed by the association.

The sprawling Ganpat Patil Nagar slum, an encroachment on mangroves in CRZ-1, has been shown as a residential zone in the DP maps. “Several plots in CRZ-1 and the no-development zone in Kanderpada, Eksar village, Dahisar village have been marked as commercial. Several water bodies along the creek that were reclaimed some time back have been assigned as commercial in the draft DP,” said Harish Pandey , a member of the association. The New Link Road Residents’ Association, which has been studying the draft development plan 201334 to understand how the area from Borivli West to Dahisar West and Dahisar East will be developed over the next 20 years, was shocked to find commercial areas marked on the high-tide line.The BMC has even marked public amenities such as cemeteries and community welfare centres in this zone.

“There are mangroves and the sea-water comes in here at high tide, but these areas have been marked for construction,“ said association members.

Debris being dumped to reclaim mangroves in CRZ-1 in Ganpat Patil Nagar, a totally illegal slum in Borivali

Moreover, the mangrove cell in a report to the Bombay High Court, which was hearing a PIL filed by the association, pointed out how an illegal parking lot for tourist buses came up on reclaimed mangroves and wetlands.“This wetland area has been shown as a bus terminus in the proposed DP. It is contempt of court,“ said Harish Pandey , a member of the association.

What has upset residents is that all these errors were found in the existing land use (ELU) plan and two years back, when the BMC had sought objectionssuggestions, they had pointed these out to the corporation. “Not a single mistake in the ELU has been rectified. This has been done to serve vested interests,” said Pandey. Local residents are upset that the BMC has no proposal for mitigation in flood-prone Dahisar East.“Rampant development in CRZ areas will only make us more vulnerable to floods,” said Pandey.

TIMES VIEW:

Citizens expect a development plan to set right the ills plaguing Mumbai but this draft DP seems to have regularised blatant encroachments on some of its most precious green zones. Mangroves are important for protecting Mumbai’s coastline and what has happened in the Borivali-Dahisar belt will result in long-term damage to the city. Can we expect at least this flaw to be set right? Or has this, too, been deliberately done to favour some lobby or political group?

Apr 21 2015 : The Times of India (Mumbai)

DP wants to even regularize CRZ-1 encroachments! This is the height of nonsense, taking law abiding tax paying citizens to be fools, while rewarding criminals who grab land illegally!