Our work has to continue in monsoon, we have to ensure there is no flooding: MMRC MD Ashwini Bhide

As of now, there is no delay. The delay which was caused due to tree cutting permissions and other issues was already factored in and accordingly, we have said that the Phase I will be completed by July 2021 and Phase II by December 2021 and we are heading towards that.

The Mayor recently said if the city floods this year it will be due to the Metro construction. What is the kind of monsoon preparedness activity MMRC has conducted?

First of all, that statement is not true. Mumbai has almost 2000-kms of road network and that much Storm Water Drain (SWD) network. Of this Metro 3 will be traversing only on 33.5 km. In that also we are intervening only in certain locations, say every one km, in a patch of 300-metre length. So if you see the overall city’s road network and the stormwater network, the intervention which Mumbai Metro 3 will be doing will be a miniscule stretch. So, naturally, only Mumbai Metro 3 cannot cause flooding. Nevertheless, we have taken all due precautions. There is a proper set system to tackle underground construction during monsoon which is followed across the globe and India. We also follow the same methodology. As far as our excavated area is concerned, where we have done piling, the flood walls are above the pile caps. These flood walls are the boundary which protects our area from the external area and similarly the external area from our intervention. We have kept the entire storm water drain network surrounding our work area clean and desilted. In the 300-m length stretch after every 1 km we had to deal with various utilities, including storm water drains during station construction. So at some locations like Mumbai Central we had to shift the drains, or support it, or we have to create a complete new drain and divert it. In fact at every 1 km we will have a group of expert people so our entire machinery is there. So if there is excessive rainfall and the municipal corporation has to take some extraordinary measures at that time we will be there to cooperate with them. There is very good coordination between officials of the Corporation, MMRDA and us. We have taken joint meetings and also did joint site visits almost two months before monsoon and accordingly the advisory was issued to the contractor. As per their requirement additional pumps have been provided. All the outlets for pumping out water have been identified and cleaned. In fact even outside our area up to 50 m, all the storm water drains have been cleaned and we have ensured that the water that gets accumulated in our area, where we have excavated, there the run off will not come. But if it is very heavy monsoon and the water comes that will be pumped out and for that all arrangements have been made. Outside our area we have ensured that all the water goes into the storm water network. In case of any emergency our site teams, which include experts from the contractors, the General Consultants and our own, will be present. Our people will be sitting in MMRDA’s control room. Most importantly, our work also has to continue during monsoon, so we ourselves have to ensure that there is no flooding. So all precautions have been taken and only because of Metro 3 there is not going to be any problem.

After a recent meeting with the Transport Secretary, MMRC had announced that noise mitigation measures will be taken to control noise levels at construction sites. What are the measures proposed?

We have already taken a lot of measures. Now there was a particular litigation where it was mentioned in the court that Metro 3 is not able to follow the noise regulations and that is why they had requested to intervene. So the transport secretary took a joint meeting with them and we explained it to them that our noise levels are not exceeding the noise regulations in isolation. The overall noise levels in the city are already higher than the stipulated noise rules. So only Metro 3 work should not be blamed for that and only Metro 3 should not be expected to work within it as the ambient noise levels are higher than the stipulated levels. So that point was put across. However, we also said that to the extent possible wherever we have gone above the existing noise levels there we can make attempts to reduce it. The noise problem is going to be temporary because maximum noise is created during piling and almost 75 percent of it is done. The noise due to piling should be over around October to December. And when we are constructing station entry-exit, only a small number of piles will be needed but that will not take so much of time and not create so much noise. Also, once we go below five to six metres then the sidewalls will act as noise barriers and the noise levels will go down substantially. In areas where we have done decking they also act as noise barriers. There are places like Shitladevi, Dadar, Worli and Acharya Atre Chowk where there is a possibility to put concrete barriers and there will be some small cutouts where we will be doing excavation. So we are looking at site specific solutions and doing whatever is possible to control the noise problem.

What is the status of the Girgaum Kalbadevi Redevelopment Plan? Has the delay in shifting PAPs affected the pace of the construction?

Right now we are in the stage of acquiring the land. It is a very complicated process there as it involves a lot of stakeholders. Before we acquire land we have to get the tenant list and area certified by MHADA and that takes a lot of time. We have been working on that for the last seven to eight months and so far we have got some seven to eight NOCs from MHADA while the remaining are in progress. All these are old buildings, more than 100 years old, so the documentation is not easily available. Neither the tenant nor the house owner have the documents. Even the property cards do not reflect a change in ownership and many of them are still 100 years old. While the ownership has changed nothing has been recorded. To award we need the updated property card and because these transactions in between are not recorded anywhere getting all the details and updating the property card itself and getting NOCs from MHADA is a challenge. Collector office, MHADA and the valuation office are helping us in getting these issues sorted out. Now about three properties we have already taken possession and more than 300 tenants have signed agreements for the alternative rental accommodation. We have almost got it vacated and the remaining ones are in progress. Looking at the complexity of the matter there was no other way to solve this issue than the way we are doing. It is not impinging on the overall progress as of now. By the end of this monsoon we will try to finish all the land acquisition process and shifting of tenant so that once we get the fare season we can start the work in a full-fledged manner. As of now we are on track and we are sure we will be able to complete the whole activity in the next two to three months.

Two more buildings have been included in the Redevelopment plan to speed up the construction work. Is commercial development under consideration?

It is not only to speed up the work but earlier there was another redevelopment proposal where we had given a NOC and the developer there had promised that he would give us space there for entry and exit. However that proposal has not moved ahead at all. So by now we need that space for entry and exit. Because until we fix the entry/ exit we cannot have the finalisation of the station box. And while we were looking for another place for entry/ exit then these two buildings came forward. The added advantage of these buildings are that they are adjacent to another property which we are already in the process of acquisition so with addition of these two buildings it becomes a single large plot which helps us in optimising our station design minimising the station length and the footprint on the road also goes down. We are obviously looking at commercial development there. It is a normal redevelopment scheme. First priority is to give houses and commercial spaces to the tenants there and then whatever additional FSI we get that will be used by us and saving the same we will recover the cost because the original project estimate the cost shown for this was not this much. It was very limited. We cannot fit ourselves into the estimated cost which was part of the total project cost. Because the land acquisition cost is more due to the new land acquisition act which was not envisaged at that time. We have to give 2.5 times more, plus the valuation of cessed property is done in a different way plus the construction cost plus the site-specific constraints. Naturally the sale component we will use. It is not to expedite the project but basically to accommodate people at the location. And everywhere else we have made attempts to optimise our station designs, ensure our station entry/exit are constructed in such a way that the time taken is lesser. There are certain inherent limitations there to speed up construction pace.

While MMRC has maintained that there was no stay by the National Green Tribunal (NGT) on construction of the car depot in Aarey, a recent hearing by the Tribunal last month has upheld the 2015 order and asked MMRC to stop work. What is MMRC’s stand on the issue?

The work has not stopped. The NGT has reiterated that there should not be debris dumping, reclamation and tree cutting. Our entire depot work does not include debris dumping at all and reclamation and trees will not be cut until we get the permission. So there is nothing new and we are following the order. We are only waiting for the tree authority’s permission, once we get it we will apprise the NGT. Our work does not include reclamation, we are not constructing in the sea. We cannot dump debris there because we need a proper land parcel so we ourselves do not dump debris. So we are not flouting any orders.

MMRC recently issued a letter to the Package 1 contractor to level a low lying land in Wadala using the muck created from tunneling for the metro. Earlier it was proposed to dump the muck in abandoned quarries and use it for other projects. Is that there is a change in plan?

This is only temporary. This is a huge project and whatever we have planned at the start of the project not everything will work. It is not that every contractor is dumping the excavated material at only those quarries. If they have some better options they are using them. These quarries that we have given are at a lead of 40-50 kms. Especially in Package 1 there are so many restrictions because of the litigations and court orders. So naturally if he has to expedite his excavation the key is how fast you transport your muck. For example, our launching shaft already had some issues because they do not allow us to work at night. So if we have to finish our launching shaft and lower our TBM in this month then we wanted some space which is close by where they can dump the muck and expedite the excavation. That area was available with us and anyway it was a low lying area so we are leveling it. It is the same methodology that we are using at the abandoned quarries. It is not a CRZ area either.

How much loan amount has the project received from Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and how much has been spent on the construction?

The first tranche has been received of about Rs 5,000 crore and around 86 percent of it has been spent. The second tranche is already approved which is of 100 billion yen, roughly around Rs 5,000 crore. It is a set system as far as JICA and GoI is concerned because the loan is between them. So GoI receives the loan and they give it to us through Pass Through Assistance (PTA) from the central budget.