Mumbai’s present infrastructure is decaying, which is not new, said HDFC’s Deepak Parekh. But he stressed that the upcoming projects will change Mumbai’s face. Parekh said this after he was felicitated as ‘Citizen of Mumbai’ for 2017-18′ by the Rotary Club of Bombay.
Parekh while speaking at Rotary Club of Bombay’s Speaker Series, said, “Some of the key mega infrastructure projects that are currently underway will certainly change Mumbai’s landscape for the better.” He also gave the Chief Minister of Maharashtra Devendra Fadnavis due credit for fast-tracking projects that have been stalled for many years but have been launched now.
He also highlighted that the change in bidding system by the present government at the centre, was a significant change in the infrastructure space. “All government tenders are now done through e-auction mechanism. One can quite confidently say that the days of exchanging brown envelopes, under, over and through the table are clearly of the past.” He reiterated that at least high-level of corruption has been weeded out and a large part of it is due to the bidding process which makes the whole process transparent.
Going further, Parekh said, “In a noisy democracy like India, building consensus for any infrastructure project is never easy.” He added that it is good that every citizen in the country can voice their view, but this makes it complicated because every regulation or law in India is always grey. “Land acquisition in this country cannot happen without controversy,” the banker said.
Raising a valid question, Padma Bhushan awardee quizzed, “Why is it that we can’t seem to strike a balance between development and preserving the environment, when so many world class cities have managed to do so?” Citing countries like Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, China and many others, he said these countries carried out reclamation to expand their cities, yet reclamation is still considered taboo in India. “I am a firm believer that reclamation and sustainability can go hand-in-hand.”
He spoke about the key projects that are taking shape in the city like Metro, Mumbai Trans Harbour link, Navi Mumbai International airport and so on. Talking about the development plan 2034 (DP 2034), he said that it leaves him confused. But he is hopeful that the revised version of DP 2034 will soon see light of the day.
Parekh, who spend over 40 years in housing and real estate sector, is confident that there is optimism about this sector. “The government has done its fair share for the housing sector.” He advocated the need to transparently provide approvals to the project in a time-bound manner, then the construction timelines will reduce and the price of homes will come down.
He concluded by saying that citizens should learn to be more tolerant of temporary discomforts if they want to see positive change in the city infrastructure. “Urbanisation is an irreversible trend. By 2040, 60 per cent of India’s population will be in urban areas. The challenge is that each time an infrastructure facility gets up and running, the demand increase exponentially.”
