Once bewitching, Bandra Reclamation promenade is now falling apart

Senior citizens in Mumbai are facing hazardous conditions on the Bandra-Worli Sea Link Promenade due to broken pathways, dust, and trash. The promenade also lacks necessary facilities such as toilets. Watchmen employed to guard the area are also facing difficulties, including a lack of proper rooms and basic resources, as well as delayed salary payments. The Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation Limited, which maintains the promenade, has stated that work to improve the situation has begun and will be completed in a month and a half.

MUMBAI: Niranjan Ledwani, 73, and his friends meet regularly for morning walks and evening catch-ups on the Bandra-Worli Sea Link Promenade. It’s a hop skip and jump from their homes, from where a view of the calming sea, fishing boats, the occasional flock of ducks and Mumbai’s skyline awaits them. The seniors take two rounds of the promenade, one end touching the toll gates of the Bandra end of the sea link, the other reaching close to Mahim Koliwada. “During high tide, the sea here is a sight to behold,” says Ledwani.

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Ever since the Covid-19 pandemic, however, the walk is no longer pleasant; it is, in fact, hazardous for the senior citizens. Parts of the promenade are barely walkable now, with intermittent unpaved, uneven and gravelly patches that send up dust into the air. Trash lies scattered around, punctuated with mounds of tiles and sand. On one stretch of the path, the bricks are broken—according to Ledwani, the path was dug up to lay cable wires five months ago and left in that state.

“Every part of the walkway is broken,” said Urmila Shah, 65. “They should have worked on one part, finished it and then moved on to the next patch. I’ve been told to come for walks because I have thyroid issues, but now I’m getting asthma.”

The greenery that borders the inner edges of the walkway is wild, weedy and has many dehydrated plants on the brink of death. “Earlier, it used to be landscaped and pretty,” said Dr D K Baheti, 79, a pain specialist at a hospital nearby. “Now we often see snakes slithering through the bushes.”

The promenade does not have a toilet either. Amazingly, the three toilet blocks that were set up after it was constructed have never been opened. Shah said that the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation Limited (MSRDC), the authority that maintains the promenade, had acceded to his request for toilets but never actually opened them.

The group of seniors point out many other flaws: lamp posts with no covers, many of which don’t work; broken swings in the children’s play area; a mural of Gandhiji and the Swacch Bharat Abhiyaan almost falling off; rusted and damaged exercise equipment; broken and overflowing garbage bins, and more. The list is long.

The picture is not rosy on the other side of the fence either. The 12 watchmen employed to guard the promenade have not been given even a proper room and basic resources. “There is no facility for drinking water here; we have to walk to a building some distance away to quench our thirst,” said Israr Ahmed. “There’s no washroom either, so we have to defecate in the open.” Ahmed points at a makeshift shelter built with bamboo sticks and tarpaulin where he cooks and sleeps. But peaceful sleep too is a rare commodity, with drunks and junkies intruding through the fence after the promenade has been closed and creating a racket.

To add to their woes, the watchmen are seldom paid their ₹14,000 salary on time. Right now, two months’ dues are pending, but whenever they ask their contractor, his reply is that MSRDC has still to give them the money. “We think twice before buying the second cup of tea in the day,” said Prahlad Singh. “We are migrant workers and have to send money back home to our families.”

When contacted, an official from MSRDC said that a contractor had been appointed for electrical, civil and gardening works. “Work has started and will be completed in a month and a half,” he said.