MUMBAI: The civic authorities have set in movement the method to clear a century’s strong waste from Mumbai’s oldest, and largest, dumping yard – that’s 20 million tonnes of rubbish on 123 acres – in order that it could actually home Dharavi’s slum-dwellers who’re ineligible for in-situ rehabilitation.
Mumbai, India – March 27, 2018: Hearth at Deonar Dumping floor, India, on Tuesday, March 27, 2018. (Picture by Praful Gangurde/ Hindustan Occasions) (HT PHOTO)
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Company (BMC) is finalising a young to clear the strong waste on the Deonar dumping yard, and appoint an company for biomining on the website. The mission, which has a deadline of three years, will the associated fee tax payer ₹2,000 crore.
The 326 acres on which the Deonar dumping floor stands is owned by the state authorities, which leased it to the BMC within the Nineteen Twenties to dump town’s strong waste. As Mumbai’s inhabitants grew, so did the quantity of waste it generated – at the moment 6,000 tonnes a day. Over time, mountains of rubbish started to pile up, reaching a staggering 40 metres, roughly the peak of a 13-storey constructing.
The 123 acres being handed over by the BMC to rehabilitate Dharavi’s slum-dwellers is a part of the redevelopment of Dharavi, one in every of Asia’s largest slums. It’s being undertaken by Navbharat Mega Builders Non-public Restricted (NMDPL), a three way partnership of the state authorities and the Adani Group. When the mission picked up momentum final 12 months, the query of rehabilitating Dharavi’s residents triggered an intense debate.
It was ultimately determined that slum-dwellers who occupied ground-floor shanties constructed earlier than January 1, 2000 would obtain free housing in-situ, or inside Dharavi itself. The remaining could be ineligible for in-situ rehabilitation and could be supplied rental housing elsewhere, at a reduced charge of ₹2.5 lakh per tenement. One of many areas earmarked for this was the Deonar landfill.
In October final 12 months, the state cupboard gave its nod to handing over 125 acres, of the entire 326 acres, of the Deonar dumping yard to NMDPL. The state additionally earmarked 255 acres of salt pan land at Kanjurmarg and Mulund, 140 acres of land at Madh, and 21.25 acres of land on the Kurla Dairy for Dharavi’s rental housing mission.
The BMC was initially reluctant to spend such a colossal sum to wash up the Deonar dumping yard however, beneath strain from the state, it relented. Municipal Commissioner Bhushan Gagrani stated, “We have now been directed by the federal government to return the land in the identical situation it was in when it was initially allotted to us within the Nineteen Twenties.’’
When the state first supplied the Deonar landfill as a doable website to rehouse a piece of Dharavi’s residents, it raised critical well being considerations for its future occupants. Though the Deonar landfill was shut and operations shifted to Kanjurmarg a decade in the past, it continues to spew poisonous gases and discharge leachate, the liquid that leaches from mounds of waste, contaminating groundwater, floor water and the soil with poisonous organic and chemical pollution.
In response to the rules of the Central Air pollution Management Board (CPCB), housing, hospitals and colleges can’t be constructed inside a landfill website, even when the landfill is formally closed. As well as, a 100-metre no-development buffer zone have to be maintained round any such website. By rehousing Dharavi’s slum-dwellers at Deonar, the state has sidestepped the rules and is pushing forward with rehabilitation on the website.