Petition urges NGT to halt commercial development of open space in Navi Mumbai

The 3,600 square-metre crippled was archetypal leased successful the twelvemonth 2000 for histrion plantation and has since developed into a greenish belt. The trees successful this country enactment arsenic a buffer betwixt the adjacent chemic portion and a residential neighbourhood.

In 2008, the MIDC decided to reclaim the onshore for allotment to project-affected persons (PAPs), but the ceremonial connection of this determination was made lone successful January 2024. Environmental groups judge the PAPs could beryllium resettled successful different locations without compromising the greenish belt.

“The unfastened abstraction successful the TTC concern area, initially allocated for histrion plantation nether a 10-year statement from 2000 to 2010, is present being reclaimed by the MIDC. With the statement having ended agelong ago, the MIDC has decided to reassign the abstraction to conscionable existent requirements,” work an RTI reply signed by the MIDC country manager, Mahape.

Environmentalists reason that repurposing the crippled for commercialized usage violates MIDC’s ain regulations, which restrict unfastened spaces to nationalist amenities specified arsenic gyms, libraries, oregon h2o tanks.

In an earlier case, the Supreme Court ruled that unfastened spaces successful approved layouts cannot beryllium repurposed for construction. In a akin lawsuit successful Navi Mumbai, the Bombay High Court overturned a determination by CIDCO to allot unfastened abstraction for existent property development, a verdict aboriginal upheld by the Supreme Court.