Even when there is practically little progress in transforming Mumbai into international finance centre (IFC), the Maharashtra government has brought the city's development at the centrestage.
The state government, which has, through its various undertakings launched infrastructure development projects of over Rs 1.03 lakh crore in Mumbai and surrounding areas, has appealed to the Planning Commission for the introduction of 'National Projects for Mega Cities'. This would pave the way for receiving 90% funding from the Centre for Mumbai and other mega cities across the country that are facing rapid urbanisation and burgeoning pressure.
State chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, who led a delegation to the Planning Commission on May 29, told Business Standard that there was need to create a separate line of funding for addressing the challenges of mega cities.
"I have requested the Planning Commission for a separate dedicated pool of funds, the access to which could be governed by totally different set of reforms having specific relevance to the development of particular mega city," he said.
Chavan said that among the slew of infrastructure projects Mumbai Trans-Harbour Link, Multi-Modal Corridor and Coastal Highway were quite crucial. As far as coastal road in Mumbai is concerned, the state government has estimated nearly 100 hectare of land needs to be reclaimed. "We hope to get the environment clearance," he noted.
Moreover, in order to make Mumbai Metropolitan Region slum-free, the state government has appealed to the Centre to consider issuing separate guidelines to free the lands of Railways, Defence, Port Trusts, and Airport Authority from encroachment.
"The Mumbai Metropolitan Region poses the biggest challenge of making it slum free in a reasonable span of time. We need out of the box solutions and we need support of all the agencies under the central government to allow detailed surveys of encumbered lands under their ownership, determine the tenability of such land from the point of view of in situ development under Rajiv Awas Yojana and also assess the requirement of alternate land for those slum dwellers who cannot be rehabilitated in situe due to operational requirement of such land or due to security considerations," Chavan said.
According to the state government, over 100,000 hutments were estimated to be residing on lands owned by the Government of India and its authorities like Railways, Defence, Port Trust and Airport Authority. The government argued that the salt pan lands under the control of central government agencies may be of immense help in this regard.
