Powai-Chandivali residents protest over illegal footpath encroachment in Powai
Powai-Chandivali residents protest over illegal footpath encroachment in Powai
Fed up on Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) over not initiating any course of action on illegal encroachments on the footpath at Adityavardhan Raheja Vihar Road in the Powai-Chandivali area, on Tuesday 17 October residents of a housing society and members of Chandivali Citizens Welfare Association (CCWA) staged a protest.
Hours later following media coverage BMC’s L ward sent a bulldozer and demolished a structure that came up a few days ago. However, the protesters need that BMC clear out all encroachments in the area.
According to Mandeep Singh Makkar, founder member of CCWA, the encroachments were nothing but a way of grabbing land ahead of the proposed road widening work.
He added that this is a political business model where footpaths are encroached on, then compensation is claimed, and projects are stalled. This is how politicians raise funds for banners and hoardings by snatching people’s amenities.
Makkar further added that CCWA in the past had raised the issue of multiple shops emerging on the footpath, but BMC did nothing. Then why the hell did they act only after we took to the streets?
As per a resident of Adityavardhan housing society, who participated in the agitation, more than a year ago, a nursery came up on the footpath. Since then, it has been joined by many shops and food joints. Three days ago, a shed was made outside our building further eating into the footpath.
However, V M Mohankumar, chairman of the housing society
asserted that a few people arrived with a JCB at night, cleared the footpath of debris and made a shed for three shops there.
Mohan Kumar added further that when they started building permanent cement structures, they sked them for a document authorising these, ironically, they declined to show any proof and instead asked us to come to the local police station.
And thus the residents visited the police station and presented their case. He also added that the society had written letters to authorities and had even taken to social media to highlight the issue.
However, Dhanaji Herlekar, assistant commissioner, L ward, claims that there are many anti-social elements who want to encroach on the land. The structure was built on a road and as soon as we came to know about it, we demolished it.
In his budget speech, BMC commissioner Iqbal Chahal had made an announcement that the civic body would map the footpaths for all major roads with more than nine-metre width and wherever footpath was found to be absent or not in good shape, a concrete footpath with international surface designs would be constructed in a fast-track mode.
Chahal had also said that BMC’s roads department had rope in urban road designers for this job. A token provision of ₹200 crore was made for this work.
News Edit K.V.Raman
