Mumbai: Over 1,500 slum dwellers in Colaba may be rehabilitated in a SRA project

 

MUMBAI: In 2017, almost 1,500 families lost their houses that lived at Cuffe parade’s Ambedkar Nagar. Their hutments were demolished as they apparently came up on mangrove land. But, now they can expect some sense of relief as a committee for the rehabilitation is set up by the Maha Vikas Aghadi Governement that will evaluate and examine what they can do the best. They will look in whether the slum dwellers can be rehabilitated in a Slum Rehabilitation Authority (SRA) project in neighbouring Ambedkar Nagar or could be provided with houses at any another location.

On Thursday, orders were issued by the State’s Revenue and Forest department to form a rehabilitation committee which will be headed by SVR Srinivas, Principal Secretary (Housing) so as to check the eligibility for these slum dwellers rehabilitation. Along with Srinivas, Milind Mhaiskar (Principal Secretary, Forests), Satish Lokhande (SRA CEO) and Rajeev Nivatkar (Mumbai City Collector) are also part of the committee. Adding to their team, officials from the state’s Mangrove Cell are also there.

As per reported by the officials, these 1,500 families were served a notice in 2015 to vacate their houses. Wherein, no action was taken after it. Then, on May 1, 2017, an announcement via loudspeaker was made in the slum area and on May 3, 2017, the demolition of the hutments was done leaving the people homeless.  

 

“The committee has been set up as per the directions of the State Human Rights Commission. It will check the documents and papers of all the 1,500 families since they have claimed that they had proof of residence and that their slums were not on mangrove land. All these claims will be verified and the committee will submit a report on if and how these slum dwellers can be rehabilitated,” said a senior bureaucrat.

 

Many of the slum people stated that homes they lost were constructed way before in 1990s and prior to the cut off date of 2011 for protected slums. The bureaucrat added, that the forest department claimed the area they demolished was in fact mangroves and was intruded by slum-dwellers.   

 

The Maharashtra State Human Rights Commission heard the case for almost 2 years and in January ordered and said that the elimination process went on for 4 days and residents got through “physical, mental trauma, financial loss and most importantly their right to shelter”. M.A.Sayeed who heads the commission has instructed Chief Secretary to form a committee of officials from forest department, revenue department, Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority and SRA to work out a rehabilitation plan for the affected families.

“It is unfair that no people’s representatives are part of this committee. There should be sustainable housing for these slum dwellers. The environment and mangroves must be protected but at the same time since they were living there for over 15 years, these slum dwellers must be rehabilitated,” as said by Rahul Narvekar, BJP MLA from Colaba. Also, he added that local elected representatives must be made part of the committee. Further adding to his statement, “However, the authorities must ensure that there is no further encroachment at the site from now on. The mangroves must be protected at all cost”.