Pvt builder allowed to redevelop Sion-Koliwada MHADA township

MUMBAI: The state government has given the nod to a proposal by the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA) regarding the redevelopment of 1,200 homes in the Sion-Koliwada area through a private builder. The residents will get bigger homes of around 635 square feet free of cost, and the housing body will get over 1,000 homes for the common man which will be distributed through a lottery, said officials.

Deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on Thursday conducted a meeting regarding various issues related to housing and redevelopment projects in the constituencies of BJP MLAs. Among them was the redevelopment project in Sion-Koliwada in the constituency of BJP legislator R Tamil Selvan. Earlier, MHADA had been asked to consider undertaking this project on the lines of the BDD chawl redevelopment. However, the housing authority expressed its inability to do so on account of a lack of funds and proposed the redevelopment through a private builder instead. After discussing the details, MHADA was given the go-ahead.

Sion-Koliwada has a huge MHADA township spread across 11 acres. There are 1,200 families there and around 200 slums, which will also benefit from the redevelopment. According to the proposal discussed at the meeting, if MHADA implements the redevelopment project through a private builder on condition of getting homes in return for extra FSI, the project will be feasible. Accordingly, it was decided that the project would be given 4 to 4.5 FSI in return for flats to the residents and slum dwellers as well as 1,000 free houses for MHADA.

Vaishali Gadpale, chief spokesperson of MHADA said the project would be completed in four years. “These 1,000 homes will be distributed to the common man at affordable prices through a lottery,” she said, adding that the cost of this project would be around ₹2,930 crore.

BJP MLA Selvan said that the 11-acre Sion-Koliwada colony had been set up to house refugees who came to Mumbai after Partition. “There were 25 buildings, in which 1,200 families used to live in small flats of around 300 square feet,” he said. “The proposal to redevelop the township was greenlighted in the Thursday meeting. The project is expected to start in one or two months.”

In the meeting, Fadnavis also cleared a proposal by MHADA to redevelop the 17 police colonies across Mumbai. As per MHADA’s primary plan, the service quarters spread across these will be relocated in seven colonies and the remaining space will be used for public housing. After redevelopment, the police department will get 4,225 flats measuring 484 square feet for low-ranking personnel and 500 apartments measuring 646 square feet for police officers in lieu of the existing flats of 180 square feet and 225 square feet.