Mayor Datta Gaikwad, Municipal Commissioner Ratnakar Gaikwad and Leader of the House Chandrakant Chhajed had a long meeting with Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh and Deputy Chief Minister Chhagan Bhujbal in Mumbai on Monday. The delegation mainly raised three issues including 50 per cent financial assistance for implementing the ambitious Rs 344 crore water supply and sewerage scheme, charging of old water rates instead of the new rates announced by the Maharashtra Krishna Valley Development Corporation (MKVDC) and concession in passenger tax to be paid by the Pune Municipal Transport to the State Government.

Gaikwad, who participated in the meeting, admitted to media persons today that the chief minister and the deputy chief minister had not given any concrete assurance to the delegation over the issues.

Gaikwad, however, said several issues like regularisation of illegal constructions in merged 38 villages, adequate police protection for anti-encroachment squad and some relaxations in implementation of slum development schemes were sorted out at the meeting.

Gaikwad said the chief minister had agreed to authorise the municipal commissioner to regularise the illegal structures im the 38 villages under section 47 B of Maharashtra Land and Revenue Code Act (MLRCA). Gaikwad said the civic administration had classified illegal structures in three categories - A (structures which can be regularised after some technical modification), B (structures which can regularised after offering some relaxations) and C (structures which will have be demolished). He said the long-pending issue of regularisation of illegal structures in the 38 merged villages would be resolved once the Government empowers the municipal commissioner to take the decision under section 47 B of MLRCA.

The municipal commissioner said the Government had also approved the civic administration's proposal of setting up seven sub-zonal offices for the merged villages. He said the Government also agreed to the demand for sanctioning staff required for the sub-zonal offices.

He also said the Government had also agreed to relax some rigid legal provisions in the existing slum development rules. Under the existing slum development provisions, slum development schemes could not be sanctioned if a plot of one hectare had less than 500 slums. According to Gaikwad, the condition of 500 slums on one hectare had proved a major obstacle in the entire schemes and that Government had agreed to bring down the number of slums to 360.