LOGISTICALLY SPEAKING. Keep land sharks off Mumbai’s port land

Nobody is against Union Minister Nitin Gadkari’s plans to build public amenities such as parks, playgrounds, promenades, schools and hospitals on Mumbai port’s unutilised land. Such common facilities — essential to any modern city — are the dream of many Mumbaikars for whom open space is a luxury. In fact, many have been demanding the development of Mumbai’s eastern coast to give the city a breath of fresh air.

For banker turned politician Meera Sanyal this theme was central to her recent election campaign. Sanyal, who is taking up development of port land along with public organisations and trade bodies, asserts that it is the only chance to revitalise the city.

However, many fear the plan runs the risk of being hijacked by land mafia in the guise of private investors and developers, exploiting the opportunity. Their apprehension stems from experience of such developments, especially that of Mumbai’s mill land, and the possibility the projects on the port land will be developed by private parties.

Chaos Manipulation of mill land is a well-known story. The norms that made it mandatory for mill owners to allot a portion of the land for creating public amenities were changed. Now, only the superrich can afford to buy a house in the area. The commercial and residential buildings that came up on the mill land without adequate public facilities only created more chaos in the area.

Given the fiscal situation of the State and the Centre, one can reasonably expect little financial support from the government for such development. So the natural alternative will be to go for the public private partnership (PPP) model. However, such public-amenity projects could eventually turn out to be expensive for users or of poor quality.

So the main issue will be how to finance the port land projects. Some have suggested that large industrial houses based in Mumbai could donate a part of their CSR (corporate social responsibility) funds to the cause. This could be a good idea but again the private businessmen will expect to get a fair return for what they invest. There are two options. Of the total 1,800 acres of land owned by the Mumbai port, areas such as Ballard Estate and Colaba are well developed. These parcels of land are on a long-term lease. The port gets only a nominal lease rent. If the government allows the port trust to make this land free-hold and sell it to the same occupants, it can raise at least ₹1,000 crore to fund the development plan.

Alternatively, constitute public trusts with prominent citizens, representatives of chambers of commerce, trade bodies and important institutions in the city as trustees to take up the development of each project. The trust can accept donations from CSR funds and also raise debt. They can build and manage the facilities without any long-term financial stake of real estate developers.

There is hope, the committee headed by Rani Jadhav, former chair of Mumbai port, will take care of these issues and ensure that enough safeguards are built in to keep land sharks away.

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