Mumbai residents to get say on modifications in development plan

While Mumbai civic commissioner Ajoy Mehta had published Mumbai’s much-delayed draft DP 2034, along with the new regulation, on May 27, 2016, senior sources told The Indian Express that a state-appointed planning committee, which had evaluated public suggestions and objections to the draft plan, had introduced significant modification to the proposed regulations and the plan itself.

Later, the civic general body, which reviewed the committee’s report, introduced significant changes to the land use plans suggested in the draft. Put together, the committee and the general body, made over 2000 modifications to the draft plan alone.

On its part, the Chief Minister-led Urban Development (UD) department, too, has made its intention of revising the floor space index norm for certain developments, by proposing modifications to the existing DC 1991, even after the new draft plan and rules had been submitted to it for sanction.

“Major changes have been proposed to the draft DP. Many of these deal with modification of a proposed reservation in the draft plan, insertion of a new reservation, zone change, and enhancing buildable area rights for plots,” said a senior official.

With the Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning Act, 1966, categorising such changes to a draft development plan as being of “substantial nature”, the government is wary that not seeking public opinion may lead to a legal wrangle.

“The Act clearly mentions that all such changes require publication of a separate ‘draft excluded plan’ on which public suggestions and objections are to be recalled,” an official said. The government’s decision comes at a time when a scrutiny committee comprising senior bureaucrats has finalised reviewing the new master plan. Sources confirmed that the scrutiny committee members had also backed the move.

It also means that Mumbai’s new development plan won’t be finalised in one go. As a first step, Fadnavis is expected to sanction the already published draft DP and DC in the coming few days, following which a notification in this regard would be issued.

On the day of the notification, the Deputy Director of Town Planning will publish a ‘draft excluded plan’ of the new DP, which would essentially include all the major modifications suggested to the draft plan, inviting public suggestions on it. While the first part of the new plan will come into force within a month of the issuance of the notification, the second part could take over six months, officials said.

While Fadnavis had earlier declared that he would sanction Mumbai’s new DP by March 31, 2018, it is now evident that the finalisation of the city’s new masterplan will take a while. A much-debated proposal of permitting higher FSI levels for all commercial developments in the city, and another to permit high-density development around transport intersections will now be relegated to the second part of the approval process.

While the civic commissioner’s draft plan had proposed unlocking of around 4,378 hectares of land, currently tagged as no-development zone, for low-cost housing, the committee had recommended some modifications to the proposal. But sources said that even this modification is likely to be a part of the ‘draft excluded plan’.

Another contentious proposal of granting FSI sops for redevelopments impacted by height restrictions imposed due to the proximity of the airport and defence land has also been relegated for now. While the UD department had earlier proposed a hike in the FSI for constructions in the island city by modifying the existing DC rules, doubts have been raised on whether this too can be directly incorporated in the draft plan.