In the annual municipal budget for FY 2021-22, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) stated that it is in the process of formulating policy to provide monetary compensation to Project Affected Person's (PAPs) who are not willing to trans-locate very far from their original place of residence.
The civic body has allotted a token provision of Rs 100 crores for this project with a hope that it will ease the civic body's burden on providing alternative housing for the affected PAPs.
“It is under consideration to give the scheduled rate fixed by the registration department of the government of Maharashtra as compensation,” stated the BMC in a statement.
Municipal chief, Iqbal Singh Chahal stated this policy will prevent delay of projects.
“Often several development projects are either delayed or part completion is achieved due to lack of alternate rehabilitation location in nearby localities of the project,” said municipal chief Iqbal Singh Chahal.
“Often in these situations, the PAPs resist efforts of shifting them to far away locations and eventually the project gets delayed causing heavy loss to the civic body, which is why we are working on proposals of providing monetary compensation to them,” Chahal added.
Ravi Raja, Leader of Opposition (LoP) in BMC and senior Congress corporator, who has criticised the overall estimated budget, lauded this policy of the BMC.
“This is a good initiative and will save both time and funds for the civic body, I hope with this BMC may be able to achieve their deadlines soon,” Raja told FPJ.
Earlier, critical road widening projects, and the Mithi River and Brihanmumbai Storm Water Drain (BRIMSTOWAD) projects were delayed because of resistance to rehabilitation from commercial PAPs.
In the past widening of two major arterial roads, Swami Vivekanand (SV) Road in the western suburbs and the Lal Bahadur Shastri (LBS) Marg in the eastern suburbs had stuck for more than a decade because of failed relief and rehabilitation attempts.
The PAP initiative was proposed way back in 2017 by the BMC, however, it has been sanctioned in the 2021-22 budget.
