Mill land: Textile museum plan stuck in red tape

On May 5,2006,the Bombay High Court had given NTC permission to flatten structures on the 16-acre mill land. “The next day,the state government wrote to NTC asking us to refrain from doing so. They said the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) was keen on having a textile museum at the site as it is a listed heritage precinct with nine notified heritage structures,” said an NTC official.

According to rules,NTC and private mill owners wishing to sell their plots have to hand over one-third of their total open space to the Maharashtra Housing and Development Authority (MHADA) and a third to BMC for open spaces. Accordingly,the NTC has to submit a plan showing the area that will be transferred to the two agencies and only after it is sanctioned by BMC can NTC go ahead with the auction of land.

Following the state government’s letter,the NTC had handed over 61,000 sq metre of land at India United Mill No 2 and 3 to BMC. After that,the state government was to pass orders to iron out a few issues. For one,since the entire land is reserved in the Development Plan for a recreation ground,the reservation had to be modified to recreation ground-cum-textile museum. “Also calculations show that of the total 61,000 sq metre,the BMC has to return 17,000 sq metre to NTC,” said the official.

Explaining the delay,a senior state government official said the BMC is yet to submit its textile museum plan to the state government. “Once they place the final plan before us,we will issue necessary orders,” said the officer.

Phase 1 of NTC mill land auction in 2005 yielded the textile corporation a total of Rs 2,100 crore from sale of five plots totalling 48 acres. Phase two of the auction,which can take place only after these issues are formally sorted out,will involve 55 acres at Kohinoor mills 1 and 2 in Dadar,India United mills 4 at Kalachowkie,Jam mills at Lalbaug,Sitaram mills in Chinchpokli and Madhusudan mills in Worli.

NTC officials point out that the present controversy over handing over the entire 12 acre of Indu mills land for the Ambedkar memorial has been fuelled due to similar bureaucratic delays. “It was agreed between NTC and the state government that we will hand over four acres for the memorial. But then the state kept dragging its feet on passing formal orders and before we knew it there was this demand from certain political parties for the entire 12 acre Indu mills land,” he said.