Rs 12,000 cr redevelopment project in Mumbai gets green signal

Shiv Kumar
Tribune News Service
Mumbai, June 22

The Maharashtra government has finally cleared a mega-redevelopment project in Mumbai under which a housing sprawl spread over 54 acres known as the BDD Chawls will be overhauled at a cost of nearly Rs. 12,000 crore.

The state government on Friday formally announced that it was awarding the redevelopment project to a consortium of companies led by Tata Projects, Capacit'e Infraprojects and the CITIC group. The consortium was the lowest bidder to redevelop the 54-acre property located at Worli in Central Mumbai at a cost of Rs 49,617 per square metre. The entire re-development spread over eight years will cost Rs 11,744 crore.

The Bombay Development Department (BDD) Chawls were constructed in Central Mumbai nearly a century ago by the British government to accommodate the growing number of people flocking to the city.

According to information available from the Maharashtra Housing and Development Authority (MHADA), the redevelopment project will employ more than 10,000 people and will take eight years to complete. The Worli BDD Chawls are home to 9,680 families who live in cramped rooms some of which measure just 160 square feet, according to the
residents. Each new house will be more than 500 sq mts each, according to MHADA officials.

Under the BDD Chawls redevelopment projects 98 buildings having between 22 and 66 storeys will be constructed. Flats in some of the new buildings will be sold in the open market to pay for the construction of the entire project.

During construction, residents living in the existing tenements will be shifted to a transit camp which will be constructed for the purpose.

“This is one of the largest single-value infrastructure projects in the country. Execution of this skyline changing, socially beneficial project, shall help Mumbai become a world-class city," Vinayak Deshpande, Managing Director, Tata Projects Ltd, said in a statement.

According to the Maharashtra government, the Bombay Development Department set up in 1920 constructed 121 chawl-type buildings between 1921 and 1925. Each building has 80 rooms.