Indian Express 03.08.2010
State looks at salt pans as rehab site for slumdwellers
Shalini Nair Tags : Malvani’s salt pans to rehabilitate slumdwellers, mumbai Posted: Tue Aug 03 2010, 00:22 hrs
Mumbai: In a first, about 23 acres in Malvani’s salt pans may soon be cleared for flats to rehabilitate slumdwellers.Mumbai’s natural bulwarks against flooding, the salt pans spread across 5,378 acres over 27 pockets such as Ghatkopar, Chembur, Turbhe, Anik, Trombay, Wadala, Kanjurmarg, Nahur, Mulund in the eastern suburbs and Virar, Dahisar, Malvani and Mira Bhayander in the western suburbs. This Central Government-owned land is managed by the salt commissioner. Almost a third of these plots are today with developers and industry houses like Godrej, Ajmera and Lok Housing.
On Monday, the state government wrote to the salt commissioner asking him to allow construction on 23 acres in Malvani. The move comes in the wake of the Chief Minister’s meeting with Central group of ministers last week.
State urban development secretary TC Benjamin said 25 of the 27 salt pan plots are under litigation. “We have asked the salt commissioner to demarcate these 23 acres for rehabilitation of slumdwellers affected by various infrastructural projects. This land is not stuck under any kind of litigation. It is part of a 45-acre area that was handed over to the ministry of urban development years ago and is at present with the Central Public Works Department,” he said, adding there has been no blanket go-ahead from the Centre on constructing on salt pan land. The state has been long toying with the idea of using salt pans for rehabilitating project-affect people or for low-cost housing. The lands fall in the inter-tidal zone and much of it is protected under the Coastal Regulatory Zone (CRZ).
Benjamin said the government is considering rehabilitation of project-affected people on available salt pans land without compromising on the ecological balance. “We are aware that salt pans act as holding ponds at the time of heavy rains and hide tides. These have been reclaimed from the sea and constructing on such land itself is not easy,” he said.
Salt pans have been in existence for over five centuries now. To prevent their exploitation by private developers who have been for long eyeing perhaps the only open patches of land in Mumbai, the heritage conservation committee in its draft heritage rules had suggested that salt pan be given the heritage tag, a proposal that’s awaiting the government’s nod.