Families stuck in cessed buildings as redevelopment stalls

Information compiled by Mhada shows 2,152 redevelopment projects involving cessed properties in the island city were issued no-objection certificates (NOCs) over the years but only 778 of them were completed. Mhada cancelled the NOCs in 46 cases, comprising 111 buildings and 2,064 tenants. Another 51,321 families living in cessed properties are stuck as their redevelopment projects have failed to take off. “At this rate, it will take almost 300 years to rehabilitate all the tenants. The scheme has been a failure, mainly because it was effectively used to oust tenants resulting in a trust-deficit between tenants and builders,” said housing activist Chandrashekhar Prabhu. The controversial policy saw an increase in FSI over the years with the maximum given by the then Shiv Sena-BJP government under chief minister Manohar Joshi in late 1990s. Builders were offered virtually unlimited floor space index (FSI) to redevelop old tenanted properties. FSI is the ratio that determines how much floor space can be consumed by buildings, resulting in highest densities and tallest buildings. Popularly known as 33 (7), the scheme has been plagued by allegations of building violations and bogus and inflated tenants’ list shown by builders so that they get more FSI to build.