MHADA to forcibly evict BDD chawl residents refusing to co-operate

The BDD chawls in Lower Parel, Naigaon and Worli were part of the government's BDD redevelopment project announced in 2017

The Maharashtra Housing Area and Development Authority (MHADA) has resolved to forcibly evict those residents of BDD chawls who are not cooperating with the authorities regarding the redevelopment of the chawls. The resolution finalised last week will now be sent to the government for their approval and will then be notified.

The state government had, in 2017, announced the BDD redevelopment project of around 207 chawls spread across 32 and 42 acres of land in Lower Parel and Naigaon (Dadar) respectively, and another 121 chawl buildings on 59 acres in Worli. Following the R16,000 crore redevelopment, residents will be able to move into swanky 500 square feet houses instead of their existing 160 square feet ones. The project is also expected to create a stock of about 16,000 houses that is likely to be used for affordable housing by MHADA.

According to sources, about 10 per cent of the residents, part of the NM Joshi Marg project, are not cooperating with the MHADA and another group of residents of the Naigaon project have opposed the eligibility surveys to be conducted on their homes. The Worli project has however progressed with tenders being allotted a few months ago and work on the survey is likely to begin soon.

A MHADA official requesting anonymity said, "We recently discussed the issue about non-cooperation since the residents denied submitting some documents during the eligibility verification process. We have made alternative arrangements for them and everything is in order. We are only trying to convince them to follow the procedure and if that doesn't happen, we are making provisions for summary eviction which is forcible eviction under the MHADA Act 95(A). We can do this in extreme cases where people are absolutely not ready to listen to us." Deependrasingh Kushwah, Chief Officer of Mumbai board, was not available for comment.

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