As many as 3,000 people spanning around 40 groups came together on Saturday to file 22,322 suggestions/objections on the draft Development Plan (DP), the highest number received in a day since the plan's launch. In fact, nine dispatch desks were set up by Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) authorities to meet the surging numbers of people.
As many as 3,000 people spanning around 40 groups came together on Saturday to file 22,322 suggestions/objections on the draft Development Plan (DP), the highest number received in a day since the plan's launch. In fact, nine dispatch desks were set up by Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) authorities to meet the surging numbers of people.
The groups, which included NGOs, activists, hawkers, slum dwellers, resettlement colony residents, urban villagers and those living on Mumbai Port Trust land assembled in Azad Maidan under the banner 'Hamara Shehar Vikas Niyojan Abhiyaan' to protest the draft DP, which they say largely ignores the needs of the urban poor. dna on Saturday reported how city hawkers felt the DP completely ignored their needs.
Haider Imam of the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) Hawkers' Union said the BMC must be accountable to people. "This DP is driven and built by corporate interests that want to steal people's rights. As per the Constitution, housing and livelihoods are basic human rights. The Street Vendors Act, 2014 allows for street vending and incorporation on street vending zones in the DP. There has been no incorporation of the thriving informal sector in the city into the DP."
Bandra resident Afreen Sheikh spoke of the need to incorporate children's needs – libraries, playgrounds for girls, and spatial norms – into the DP. Prakash Kumbhar, a Mankhurd transit camp resident, highlighted the failures of resettlement in Mumbai.
"The DP is an opportunity to make sure such displacement and injustice does not take place among future generations in the city," Kumbhar said.
Aravind Unni of the NGO YUVA demanded an extension of the 60-day period until the draft DP report is translated in Marathi and Hindi.
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