How Maharashtra election results could impact future of key civic projects

Projects like concretisation of Mumbai’s roads, the Gargai Pinjal Plant and creation of an open park at Mahalaxmi Race Course have been mooted and endorsed by the ruling government. However, projects like the desalination plant, conceived during the previous Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) regime, were put on the back-burner during the present government’s tenure.

These incidents have led to multiple political slugfests between the state’s ruling and opposing alliances in the last two years. While MVA has announced they will scrap these projects when voted to power, Mahayuti has emphasised the importance of these projects for Mumbai’s holistic development.

The Mahalaxmi Race Course

This project has sparked much political slugfest for more than a year now. The BMC in January this year had proposed taking over a major chunk of the race course land and developing it into a public park. CM Eknath Shinde endorsed the move, saying it would add an additional 120-acre of open-green space to the city.

Meanwhile, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader and MLA Aaditya Thackeray openly labelled it as a land-grabbing move by Mahayuti government in a means to commercialise the entire plot. Aaditya also said the proposal would be scrapped if MVA comes to power. He had said he stands against any attempt to grab the 226-acre open space in Mahalaxmi. “We are saddled with extreme pollution with no government official even bothering to respond or act to resolve it. We can’t let go of our open spaces on the whims of a BJP sponsored–CM who wants to build structures on it,” Aaditya had said in a social media post.

“The open park at Mahalaxmi Race Course is going to be a gift to Mumbaikars. 120 of the 226 acres will be developed into an open space as an oxygen park. No construction will be carried out there. Our vision is to transform Mumbai in the best interest of the city,” he had said.

Gargai-Pinjal water supply project and desalination plant:

To cater to growing need for water, BMC in 2016 had mooted the proposal of building a network of dams at Gargai-Pinjal and Damanganga-Pinjal river links in Palghar district. It was mooted by then CM Devendra Fadnavis and BMC had earmarked a budget of Rs 3,100 crore.

Work on this project was in full swing but when Uddhav Thackeray led-Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) came to power in 2019, this project was halted citing environmental concerns as the project would require cutting of 4.5 lakh trees. As an alternative, the MVA government floated the proposal of constructing a Rs 1,600 crore desalination plant equipped to supply 440 million litres of water per day (MLD).

BMC had floated tenders for the desalination plant last year, and scrapped them in September this year citing poor response from bidders.

When in 2022, the Shinde–Fadnavis led Mahayuti government came to power, the Gargai Pinjal project was rekindled. BMC had also acquired land in Chandrapur for carrying out compensatory afforestation for the project.

Recently, while Mumbai suffered a prolonged period of water shortage, BJP MLA and Mumbai president of party Ashish Shelar took a dig at the MVA government for scrapping the project.

“Desalinating of seawater has multiple negative environmental impacts, besides being very costly. We had pointed this out but the MVA government still pushed for it, while also cancelling the Gargai-Pinjal project citing trivial issues to benefit their contractor friends,” Shelar had said.

However, Aaditya maintained his stand of rekindling the desalination plant over the Gargai Pinjal project. “Even if one constructs a dam, where will you get the water from if there is no rain? We need to shift from rain dependency to other sources. A decade ago, producing one litre of water through desalination cost Rs 27, today, it is down to Rs 11.50. The cost of water supplied by dams is similar to that of desalination,” Aaditya had said in one of his campaigning events.

Road concretisation

After forming government in 2022, the Shinde-Fadnavis government announced concretisation of 397 km of Mumbai roads at a cost of Rs 6,000 crore in a bid to make them pothole-free. However, Sena–UBT’s Aaditya Thackeray openly opposed this project labelling it to be a scam. He had also alleged that the valuation of this project was inflated many folds and had written to the municipal commissioner, urging him to scrap this project.

The Sena–UBT leader also alleged inflation of the cost of this project.

Meanwhile, CM Shinde in his speeches has maintained that the project will transform Mumbai roads.