Hindustan
Times: Mumbai: Sunday, 01 March 2020.
Despite
receiving 2,563 suggestions and objections on the proposed Metro Bhavan at
Aarey Milk Colony, the Maharashtra government is yet to hold a public hearing
for citizens on the change in land-use. The government had invited suggestions
and objections on the change in land-use for 2.03 hectare of land in the
contested Aarey area from no-development zone to ‘Metro Bhavan and Metro Rail
allied users’ in August 2019.
In
a reply to a right-to-information (RTI) query by HT, the town planning
department said that the suggestions and objections by citizens have been sent
to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) and the Mumbai Metropolitan
Region Development Authority (MMRDA) to obtain their remarks. “We will soon
call citizens for a public hearing on the suggestions/objections. Post this, a report
will be submitted to the state government,” the reply to the RTI stated.
MMRDA,
which is executing 13 Metro lines in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), has
planned a central operation and control centre on a 2-hectare plot at Aarey.
The basement-plus-27-floor building will be constructed at a cost of ₹1,033
crore.
An
MMRDA official confirmed that the authority had mainly received objections
stating that the Metro Bhavan be shifted from Aarey. “We have sent our remarks
to the town planning authority,” the official said.
The
decision to construct the Metro Bhavan at Aarey will be a sticky subject for
the current state regime. After assuming office in November 2019, chief
minister Uddhav Thackeray had stalled construction of the Metro-3 car shed, stating
that there will no more tree-cutting in the green lung. However, the government
has not made its stance clear on the Metro Bhavan plan.
Zoru
Bhathena, an environmental activist who had filed an objection in 2019, said,
“The authority is just sitting on the issue now. Also, when the town planning
had invited objections, we had pointed that the land in question is not a
no-development zone but a green zone and its land use cannot be changed without
obtaining clearance from the environment ministry.”
Yash
Marwah, another activist said, “It’s already been seven months since the state
called for objections. There must be a public hearing as soon as possible so
citizens can put forth their viewpoints on the plan.” In September 2019, 51,655
Mumbaiites had objected to the construction of Metro Bhavan at Aarey on an
online portal run by Marwah.
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