Ambedkar memorial project: MMRDA to invite bids before April 14

Detailed project report and drawings have been approved

With Ambedkar Jayanti around the corner, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) plans to invite tenders for construction of the Dr B R Ambedkar memorial at Indu Mill in Dadar before April 14. “We will invite global tenders for the project before Ambedkar Jayanti and should receive responses in three months. After tender evaluation and finalisation the actual work for the memorial will start,” said MMRDA Additional Metropolitan Commissioner Pravin Darade. The Maharashtra government, having officially received possession of Dadar’s Indu Mill last month from the NTC, hopes to fast-track the work on the long-pending project.

The Centre formally transferred the 12-acre Indu Mill land to the state government from on March 25. The MMRDA has already completed demolition of old structures on the land and in allocated a sum of Rs 50 crore for the memorial its recent budget. The detailed project report and drawings for the memorial have also been approved by the committee headed by Social Justice Minister Rajkumar Badole. Architectural firm Shashi Prabhu and Associates, the designers for the project, has been directed to submit all design data regarding the project to the MMRDA before April 10 so that tenders can be invited in time for Ambedkar Jayanti (April 14).

“We are currently working on the micro-detailing of the project and are on time to submit all the designs by April 10,” said Shashi Prabhu. Planned to be constructed in three years, the main highlight of the Rs 500-crore memorial will be the 350-foot Ambedkar statue. “At the pedestal of the statue will be a library, a museum and lecture halls. It will also have an indoor cyclorama, a feature that will allow 360 degree view of images making you feel a part of it. The mill land has an old pond, which we plan to convert into a replica of the Chavdaar pond. There will also be a landscape garden and all the existing trees on the land will remain untouched,” adds Prabhu.