Four years after the tenure of development plan (DP) ended for the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC),the civic administration at last has finalised the draft of the new DP and tabled it before the City Improvement Committee. The revised DP is likely to address the pending issue of dilapidated wadas along with provision for reservation for new initiatives. I had taken charge of preparing the new DP on October 15 and have completed the draft plan. The DP has now been tabled before the City Improvement Committee, said city engineer Prashant Waghmare on Tuesday. He,however,refused to divulge details,saying this can only be done by the committees chairperson. The revised DP is for the 146-sq km of the old city. According to civic sources,the new DP includes the reservations made in the 1987 DP,and no reservation has been deleted. The hilltop and hillslope plans also remain intact, sources said. Committee chairperson Arun Dhimdhime said he was fortunate that revised DP has been tabled during his tenure and he can work on resolving the citizens woes. We had recommended addition of provisions to resolve the deadlock over re-development of wadas. It has been included in the revised DP and tenants along with the owners of wadas will benefit from of it, he said. There was also a demand for the provision of additional floor space index (FSI) for hostels and old age homes,Dhimdhime said,adding that the demand has been met with in the new plan. The civic administration has also proposed new roads,widening of existing roads and flyovers as in the comprehensive mobility plan. The DP is based on socio-economic,demographic and land use surveys carried out by the PMC. The DP,after the nod of the committee,will be tabled in the general body meeting for final approval,after which suggestions and objections from citizens will be invited. It will then be sent to the state government for final approval. The civic body has to get approval for the DP for its jurisdiction for 20 years as per the Maharashtra Region Town Planning Act,1966. The tenure of the DP for the city,approved in 1987,had expired in 2007. The PMC,however,declared its intention of revising the DP in December 2007,which meant it got two more years to prepare the draft plan. The PMC had to seek extension with the work not finished till December 2009,but it did so only in February 2010. In October 2010,the then municipal commissioner Mahesh Zagade set up a dedicated cell for revision of DP with city engineer Prashant Waghmare as its in-charge and delegated the routine work to additional city engineer Vivek Kharwadkar. In December 2010,the PMC again sought extension of one year from the state government for completing the DP.
