Work of Chandani Chowk flyover to commence soon as PMC acquires 90 per cent land

The work of the Chandani Chowk flyover will is likely to commence by this month end, as the Pune municipal corporation (PMC) has finally managed to acquire 90 per cent of the land for it. The PMC had set a target of starting the work by December end.

Girish Bapat, Pune district guardian minister discussed the issue of land acquisition for the Chandani Chowk flyover with municipal officials and National highway authority of India’s (NHAI) officers on Wednesday.

Nitin Gadkari, union minister and Sharad Pawar, NCP leader did the ground breaking ceremony of this project last year, but the PMC was not able to kick start the work as it did not have the land in possession.

Prashant Waghware, PMC city engineer confirmed that 90 per cent of the land for the project has been acquired by the PMC and only 10 per cent of the land is left to acquire. He said that PMC will acquire the remaining 10 per cent of the land within two weeks. He added, “There are two court cases, but PMC will keep an amount, as instructed by the court which will be disbursed in future.”

However, the NHAI officials in the meeting suggested that they would start work only after the entire land has been acquired by the PMC, as they do not want any hurdles once the work has begun. In the review meeting the officials decided that they would ensure that the process of acquiring the remaining 10 per cent of the land will be completed in two weeks and the work of the flyover will finally begin by the end of December.

Dilip Vede Patil , BJP corporator who was also present at the meeting said, “ The NHAI has asked to acquire 100 per cent land as it is a different project where NHAI is doing the works on behalf of PMC. We are discussing with rest of the land owners and they are ready to hand over their land.” 

A total of 14 hectares of land is required for the entire project. As the land cost is high, Nitin Gadkari, union minister requested chief minister Devendra Fadnavis to bear the cost. The chief minister has already sanctioned ₹184 crore for land acquisition.

The NHAI have completed the tendering process for the land acquisition and once the PMC will hand over 100 per cent land, NHAI will issue the work order to the concerned contractor, said Vede Patil. 

Earlier this project was planned by PMC, but both central and the state government assured the PMC that instead of spending civic body’s money, they would construct this multi-level flyover at Chandani Chowk.