Crumbling wadas under lens again,no solution in sight

He said the PMC has been regularly conducting the survey of buildings in its jurisdiction. “There is a team in each of the 14 ward offices to monitor the conditions of the structures in their jurisdiction and initiate steps if the structures are in poor condition,” Adhari said. The PMC this year brought down 19 such wadas and allowed reconstruction plans for five such structures,he said.

The re-development of the dilapitated wadas has remained stuck owing to a dispute between the owner and tenants. The owners do not favour sharing the new redeveloped structure with the tenants while the tenants demand rights due to long stay in the property for which they pay very meagre amount as rent.

“The dispute of wada owner and tenant came to us many times. The PMC has no role in it but it does help resolve the dispute in the interest of the public as the lives of residents are at stake in these dilapitated buildings,” said Prashant Waghmare,a city engineer.

Meanwhile,the PMC building department thath has drawn fire for not giving permission to repair work for dangerous wadas within 48 hours of receiving the application as per a government resolution,defended itself by faulting the lack of required documents for granting the necessary sanction.

Between April 2010 and June 2011,the the PMC’s building control department received around 142 proposals for repair work. Of these, 87 proposals have been cleared,while 55 are pending due to documents not being produced by the concerned persons for repair work. “There are some issues between the tenants and owners regarding the documents and so we had to keep it pending,” said NG Gambhire,PMC deputy engineer (building control department).

A tenant from Kasba Peth said though her balcony wall was about to collapse,the owner is refusing to lodge a complaint with the ward office. “We have been telling the owner to repair the wada and there has been no response,” said Ranjana Desai who has been living in the wada since 1965. She is among the four families living in the wada in the area.

The peth areas,including Kasba Peth,Somwar Peth,Raviwar Peth and Nana Peth,house about 10,000 wadas. The PMC had carried out a survey of 1,585 old wadas in the city by roping in an agency. However,officials said these persons have not come up with requests to repair the wadas. “We are ready to give the clearances within 48 hours as per the GR,but these buildings do not have the necessary papers with most of them coming in from the tenants and not owners,” says Gambhire.

BJP MLA Girish Bapat,who had raised the issue in an Assembly session,said at a meeing called by the UDD secretary last year,where divisional commissioner Dilip Band was also present,rehabilitation of tenants and making the repair work economically viable were discussed. “However,there has been no progress on this issue while even the slum rehabilitation scheme,which also includes repair work of wadas,has not been taken up,” Bapat said. “The PMC has received 671 proposals for the re-development from the area,of which 519 have been approved and 15 are pending for want of papers,” Gambhire said.