The Maharashtra Coastal Zone Management Authority (MCZMA) has rejected the CRZ permission for the construction of a residential cum commercial building on a 1950 sqm plot allotted by the State Government-owned city planner CIDCO in the Dronagiri node.
The plot falls in sector 53 in Dronagiri and the authority found that the majority portion of the plot is situated within a 50 m mangrove buffer zone area.
Environmentalists say that it’s not about one project that was rejected, “It is about the government-owned body allotting environmentally sensitive areas to various projects is worrisome,” environmentalists said.
The project which was rejected to give the CRZ permission is located at sector 53 in Dronagiri and the MCZMA reviewed the proposal at its meeting held on June 15. As per the minutes of the meeting, about 90% of the plot and the proposed building fall under CRZ-1A, and hence the proposal is rejected as per the Bombay High Court judgment of September 18, 2018.
The meeting is part of the marathon sessions that MCZMA planned after a long break to consider some 200 pending proposals.
“At least 94 projects which have been completed have now been held up for want of Occupancy Certificates (OC) due to the CRZ issue. The MCZMA will have to clear them,” said B N Kumar, director of NatConnect Foundation.
The plots falling under CRZ1 and within 50 meters of the hightide line are bound to be rejected as per the Bombay High Court judgment that prohibits any construction in that zone. “This is what the MCZMA has exactly done,” Kumar said and the planning authority for allotting such plots to project-affected persons (PAPs).
“This is not the first such case,” said Nandakumar Pawar, head of Shri Ekvira Aai Pratishthan (SEAP). The entire Uran taluka is an ecologically sensitive zone, yet mangrove areas and wetlands are being developed for infrastructure projects. “These projects are now doing massive landfill which is playing havoc as the low-lying villages are getting flooded,” added Pawar.
