November 23, 2017

 

If civic chief Ajoy Mehta has his way, 41 public projects worth over Rs 30,000 crore will commence before March 2018, around the time his tenure ends in the BMC.

These include eight swimming pools, a 12-acre sports complex at Andheri, widening of roads, beautification projects, restoration of heritage structures, hospitals.

"Once the tender is floated for a project the additional commissioners are expected to ensure that the work gets off ground," said Mehta. Last week, he allotted the work to four additional municipal commissioners and asked them to prepare individual timelines. The four additional commissioners will prepare a vision document of these projects within a week.

The addition of new public swimming pools should come as a welcome move considering there are just six civic pools in the island city.

The new pools planned will be at Worli hill reservoir, Vikhroli, Malad, Kondivita in Andheri (east), Gilbert Hill in Andheri (west), Dahisar, Govandi and an Olympic-size one in Kandivli (west).

The Rifle Club at Worli will also get a facelift. The south Mumbai phase of BMC’s coastal road project will start in the coming months along with the Rs 4,000 crore Goregaon-Mulund Link Road (GMLR).

Shiv Sena leader in the civic House Yashwant Jadhav said the civic administration must ensure works are completed within a stipulated time. Another important project initiated by the BMC is surveying properties with the help of vehicle-mounted camera and scanners, which began early this year. It provides a panoramic image of buildings and data, which gives length, width, height and even polygon area in sq metres. This data will be used to validate tax records and point out deviations, if any.

Officials said this will add to municipal revenue by taxing buildings which were not assessed. The project cost is Rs 57 crore.

Samajwadi Party leader in the BMC Rais Shaikh said every project must be completed within a timeline. "However, our experience is that delays occur in movement of files between two departments. Hopefully, supervision at the additional municipal commissioner’s level will expedite the projects," said Shaikh.

A cycle track along the Tansa pipeline across Mumbai and the 111-hectare Central Park reclaimed from the sea at Cuffe Parade are among the 41 projects scheduled to commence next year.

Right to Information activist Anil Galgali said that this was a positive step as putting responsibility on IAS officers would mean that they need to ensure that work takes off. "For any delay in projects, it is the lower-rung officials who are blamed. If the job is put on an additional commissioner it will help fixing accountability," he said.

"Once a project takes off there are certain changes and alterations that happen and one cannot keep going to senior officials all the time," said BJP’s Manoj Kotak.

Standing committee member and Asif Zakaria said that any project for enhancement of services to be provided to citizens is a welcome move. "In the frenzy of making announcements for new projects in the city, its implementation in the long run is never given thought and eventually it keeps on dragging once it begins on ground," said Zakaria.

The announcement of a new sports facility at Andheri left many wondering if there was really a need for one as there is already the Andheri Sports Complex, which is spread across 11 acres. The new one is proposed to be built on Veera Desai Road in the same area.

Andheri Sports Complex, officially named Shahaji Raje Bhosale Kreeda Sankul, has facilities for swimming, football, karate, tennis and boxing. Private community gatherings and award functions are organized there.

It was inaugurated in 1991 and redeveloped as recently as 2016. Its Olympic-size swimming pool, which was closed for years, was reopened after public clamour. A large football stadium was designed in 2016.

Local MLA Bharti Lavekar said, "The proposed plot on Veera Desai Road is larger than Andheri Sports Complex. The two cannot be compared. Only football is played at the existing complex. The new structure will be a large stadium that will serve the city well."

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