CONCEPT QUESTIONED: Why have a cutoff at all,say activists

Amita Bhide,professor in the Tata Institute of Social Studies’ urban studies department,called the cutoff concept arbitrary. “As long as the city is open to migrants,the right to housing can’t be restricted to a particular class. Also,the idea of treating a post-1995 structure as legal denies eligibility to those who have been in the city for decades but have bought a new structure.”

He found the state position contradictory: it wants 2000 as the cutoff date for the Mumbai Urban Infrastructure Project and schemes for the Mithi river,airport slums and Dharavi redevelopment,but has specified none for the World Bank funded Mumbai Urban Transport Project. This means shanties cleared from one area only mushroom in another.

Changing deadlines also cause confusion among authorities implementing projects. Municipal commissioner Jairaj Phatak admitted recently,“We have to be careful while taking action on hutments and deadline issues create problems.” The civic body will need to resettle those found “eligible” among the 26,000 hutments to be razed for the storm water drainage system,and another 65,000 families for various water and road projects.

The realty industry believes extension would improve the feasibility of SRA schemes. “Though the decision is based on political agenda,the extension will help several schemes that didn’t take off because of deadline disputes,” said developer Sunil Mantri of the Maharashtra Chamber of Housing Industry. From the developer’s perspective,he said,the move would mean an increase in rehabilitation tenements and sales.

Mayor Shubha Raul called it a “very unfortunate decision”. “The Congress-NCP government is out to woo voters. Most of these slumdwellers are Bangladeshis. We cannot solve the problems of locals who have been here for decades; how can we cope with the extension to new slumdwellers?” she said.

(Inputs from Shweta Desai)