Looking for avenues for construction of affordable houses in Mumbai with its own land bank in the city on the decline, the state housing authority is eying a nine-acre plot in Oshiwara in Andheri West that is currently encroached. According to the proposal by the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA), about 3.5 acres of this land would be used for construction of houses that will ultimately be sold through the authority’s annual lottery of low-cost houses. The rest would be partially set aside for a parking plaza, which is the original reservation on the land as per the development plan, and rehabilitation of the existing occupants. “The land originally belonged to MHADA. Earlier, we had thought that the redevelopment would be through the Slum Redevelopment Authority (SRA) since the land is encroached, but that would not yield us any low-cost houses. So now we have proposed to implement a redevelopment scheme for the commercial encroachments on one side of the plot with the required incentive to the developer as per norms. The rest of the space would be used to implement the development plan reservation of a parking plaza and build affordable houses,” said a MHADA official who did not wish to be named. The housing authority will, however, go ahead with this scheme only after seeking consent from the SRA and the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), which is the special planning authority for the area in which the land is located. “We estimate that about 14,000 to 15,000 square metres (about 3.5 acres) will be available for development of houses after rehabilitating the commercial outlets and setting aside land for a parking plaza. Construction amounting to an area of about 1.25-1.5 lakh can be built on this space,” the official added.. The housing authority is left with negligible vacant land to develop in Mumbai to continue to provide low-cost houses in the city. Most of its 1,500 hectares in Mumbai is occupied by its 56 colonies over 104 layouts, while of the rest, more than 80 plots are encroached. The housing authority has now decided to itself undertake redevelopment of slums on its own land through slum rehabilitation schemes. The Oshiwara plot development will be one of the first such projects. The encroached plots were earlier being redeveloped through the SRA where MHADA would simply hand over the land to the chosen developer at the ready reckoner rate without getting any share in the housing stock generated. manasi.phadke@expressindia.com
