Pvt developer offered land for Metro 3 car shed in 2015, MMRCL considered it

Mumbai: The Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited (MMRCL) had considered using land offered by a private developer to build the Metro-3 car shed, and had even written to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to reflect this in the city’s development plan (DP)

Mumbai: The Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited (MMRCL) had considered using land offered by a private developer to build the Metro-3 car shed, and had even written to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to reflect this in the city’s development plan (DP).

Mumbai, India - July 27, 2022 : Tree Cutting inside Metro 3 Crashed at Aarey Colony, Goregaon, in Mumbai, India, on Wednesday, July 27, 2022. (Photo by Vijay Bate/HT Photo)

The parcel of land owned by the Royal Palms township is adjacent to Aarey Colony where the car shed is to come up. To be sure, the city’s DP does not currently reflect any change in the plot’s land use. The reservation, included in the draft version of the DP, was later deleted in 2018.

On July 17, 2015, Muhammed Nensey, managing director, Royal Palms India Pvt. Ltd,

wrote identical letters to the then chief minister (and current deputy CM) Devendra Fadnavis, Ashwini Bhide (managing director, MMRCL) and Charuhas Jadhav (also from MMRCL), as well as UPS Madan (then commissioner, Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development Authority), which stated: “We have 240 hectares of private land adjoining Aarey Milk Colony about 1km further from the present yard proposed by you and are in a position to allot you 30 to 60 acres of land for your project... In return, we would request you to allot us 4 additional to normal floor space index (FSI) on our land as is allowed by the BMC under the Parking Policy.”

On July 29, 2015, Yadav, project in-charge for Metro-3, replied to Nensey stating: “You are requested to submit location plan of the offered plot on Google Map, contour plan, documents of property ownership and any other relevant document immediately so as to take further necessary action.” Hindustan Times has seen a copy of this letter.

Nensey submitted the required details the following day. HT has seen a copy of a letter written by Nensey stating this.

In April 2016, the MMRCL wrote to the BMC seeking a change in the city’s DP to allow use of the land for the car-shed — an indication that the proposal was under serious consideration.

In the letter dated April 30, 2016, under the subject ‘Revision of Development Plan for Greater Mumbai 2034 — Incorporation of reservation for Metro car depot for Line 3 and allied facilities at an additional site outside Aarey’, MMRCL wrote: “The said plot is located about 2.5km north of the existing Aarey depot plot.” It stated that MMRCL had conducted a preliminary survey and technical evaluation to assess the land’s “engineering and operational feasibility” and requested the BMC to reserve it as “Metro Car Depot, Allied Facilities and Commercial C-1 Zone”.

The matter came to light after Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Kirit Somaiya made videos, which were circulated over social media platforms earlier this week, alleging that a non-governmental organisation (NGO) had “colluded” with a private builder to change the site of the proposed car shed.

Somaiya alluded to a letter that Vanashakti, a city-based environment group, wrote to Fadnavis in October 2015, suggesting that the state use the land of a private developer, adjacent to Aarey Colony, to build the Metro-3 car shed instead of the its proposed location at Prajapurpada village.

Stalin D, director, Vanashakti, however refuted Somaiya’s claims on Wednesday and called it an attempt to malign his organisation.

“How can a former Member of Parliament, and an official party spokesperson, make such wild allegations suggesting that we have colluded with a private builder? Especially when his own government at the time had considered Royal Palms’ land offer quite seriously? We have filed multiple complaints with local authorities against Royal Palms for violating environmental laws,” Stalin said.

Stalin said that the builder wrote to Vanashakti on August 26, 2015, seeking its opinion on their proposal made to the state government. Stalin forwarded the builder’s letter to the CM in October 2015, and included a statement of its own opinion in the matter.

“We (Vanashakti) have already given eight options that should be seriously considered as an alternative to destroying the landscape of Aarey and its forests. During the course of the events, last month we have received a letter from a private land owner near Aarey who has offered his land an alternative to the site inside Aarey. Further it appears that the landowner is not seeking any monetary compensation for the land and that it does not have any trees on it. Since we are keen to protect Aarey Colony we are forwarding the letter to you for consideration in tune with laws and regulations. If found suitable and legal the site may be considered as an added option suggested by us,” Vanashakti’s letter from 2015 stated.

Vanashakti is one of the petitioners who have filed cases in both the Bombay High Court and the Supreme Court to protect Aarey Colony, the city’s green lung, from construction of infrastructure works.

In the video that began circulating this week, Somaiya said in Marathi, “The Aarey metro shed work has been stopped by the Vanashakti NGO. They have said that the car-shed can be built by taking Royal Palms’ private land from the builder, for which ₹4,800 crore worth of FSI will need to be given in exchange... The NGO has received money from America for this. We won’t have to cut any more trees for the car-shed in Aarey. Only 30 hectares of land will be used. If it is taken to Kanjurmarg, it needs only 15 hectares of land but the cost will increase from ₹23,000 crore to ₹43,000 crore and the project will be stalled for the next seven years. I urge everyone to let this project be implemented now.”

“I have not made any allegations, only stated facts. Vanashakti is an NGO. They should be carrying out tree plantations and education drives to build awareness for the environment. It is not their job to tell the government where to build the car-shed, let alone suggest that they do so on a private developer’s land. It should be asked what the NGO has to gain by making this suggestion, which is favoring the builder of Royal Palms,” Somaiya said on Wednesday.

MMRCL officials declined to comment on why the proposal that it was considering did not come to fruition. Both the phone numbers of Nensey remained unreachable.

The Metro-3 car shed has been at the centre of a controversy ever since the newly-formed Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis government reversed the previous government’s decision to construct the car shed in Kanjurmarg instead of Aarey Colony. The decision to bring back the car shed in Aarey Colony has sparked widespread protests among citizens again, who worry that the construction in the city’s green lung will spell an ecological disaster.