Faced with overwhelming opposition from citizens and political parties, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has opted for a radical overhaul of the draft development plan 2034 in just four months. Political compulsions aside — though the Shiv Sena’s strident demand to scrap the existing draft DP altogether did exert pressure on the ruling alliance — the CM’s decision should also be viewed in the light of the many controversies that the blueprint had generated with several ominous omissions and commissions. Its many bloopers include delisting the city’s landmark heritage structures and precincts, reducing open spaces, paying scant regard to the already depleting green cover and proposing roads through housing societies. In the six-year-long exercise that culminated in an error-riddled draft, two things are crystal clear: a) The agency entrusted with creating the blueprint has turned out to be incompetent; b) The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation lacks the foresight to tackle Mumbai’s existing problems, let alone contemplate the future. 

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Now, a course correction in just four months — Fadnavis has assured a revised DP in such a short duration — is fraught with risks. The allegations that the development plan was based on satellite images — the primary reason for some ridiculous blunders — should now impel the BMC to visit the nooks and crannies of the city. Given its current manpower, it seems impossible to carry out such a survey in limited time. The civic body should ideally employ an army of surveyors at the earliest if it wants to meet the deadline. If it chooses to only respond to the 25,000 complaints it received to date, that would be a knee-jerk reaction. Moreover, an independent body of architects and town planners, outside of the BMC, should look at the new draft before it again goes public. The twin aims of being objective and plugging the existing loopholes might suffer if the same set of civic employees are asked to review their earlier decision.

Like all development plans, the main objective for DP 2034 should have been making Mumbai a competent city that would draw businesses and talent from all over the world. That would entail creating an infrastructure that would pave the way for sustainable, pragmatic development, keeping in mind the needs and aspirations of both residents and commercial establishments. Today, Mumbai’s reputation as the financial capital of the country has been overshadowed by the quality of life it offers, and its inability to provide basic amenities to large sections of its people. Still it draws thousands of migrants from all over India because of lack of development in other parts of the country. Consequently, in a city starved of dwelling places, rents are sky-high and affordable housing is an impossible dream. The latest DP should have factored in all these problems before it began to chart a course for the future. Even when the DP’s intentions have been noble — like higher FSI in buildings close to mass transit systems — it has mindlessly borrowed ideas from metros abroad, without ascertaining its feasibility in Mumbai. 

Forget transforming Mumbai into Shanghai, the BMC should concentrate its energies on making the city habitable. Where people travel long distances to reach their workplaces, where the numbers of parks and recreational centres are shrinking, where open spaces are encroached upon, vehicular pollution has risen by leaps and bounds and where archaic sewage systems are overburdened and crumbling, the maximum city is way past its expiry date. That’s a shame not just for Maharashtra, but for the rest of the country as well!