Forest ministry okays land for dam

The ministry of environment and forest (MoEF) has given nod to the Brinhanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) for converting forest land for the middle Vaitarna dam.

The nod was necessary, as constructing the dam would submerge about 634 hectares of forest land.

"The government of India has given permission for diverting forest land for the middle Vaitarna project. On the basis of this, we will go back to MoEF with a request to grant us the final environment clearance, which is required to start the project," said Manukumar Srivastava, additional municipal commissioner, BMC.

The dam, which is a part of the Mumbai-4 project, once completed, will add 455 million litres of water per day (MLD) to Mumbai. The amount of investment for the dam comes to Rs 1,600 crore. It is partly funded by the Centre under the National Urban Renewal Mission (NURM).

The corporation has already sent a proposal to the Union government for sharing 35 per cent project cost under NURM. The state is expected to share 15 per cent of the total cost and the rest 50 per cent, will be raised by the corporation.

The civic body has already paid Rs 88 crore to purchase land from the state government in Beed district for afforestation.

"This total amount is not exactly the land cost. A major portion of it - Rs 58 crore - is the present net value of the land, which is going to submerge. The remaining cost is for the alternative afforestation (in Beed district)," said Srivastava.

The project is scheduled to be completed by 2011. "By that time, water requirement of the city will also increase. And the project is to ensure that we do not run short of water," he added.

Currently, Mumbai gets 3,100 MLD as against the required 4000 MLD. Sources said that due to overflow of water at the existing Vaitarna dam, a large amount of water goes unused. The middle Vaitarna will take care of the excess overflow of water.

"We are trying to get the environmental clearance as soon as possible and once that is in place, we will start work," said Srivastava. If everything goes fine, the construction is expected to start by 2007.

The corporation has awarded the contract to the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Bombay for planting 2.5 lakh trees over 670 hectares of land in order to compensate the loss incurred to the environment in terms of forest.