Mumbai: Amid controversies over BMC and Mhada’s move to lease three plots totalling 16 acres to a trust headed by him, BJP MLC Amrish Patel sought CM Devendra Fadnavis’s “immediate intervention” to ensure that the allotments are not cancelled. The CM directed BMC chief Ashwini Bhide and Sanjeev Jaiswal, vice-president and CEO of Mhada, which owns two of the plots, to examine the request and “do the needful”.Claiming that the allotments were made with his “blessings”, Patel, who is also a trustee of Shri Vile Parle Kelawani Mandal that runs some educational institutions, including Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS), asked Fadnavis in a letter to speak to Bhide and Jaiswal and instruct them not to take any “adverse action” based on city BJP chief and Andheri West MLA Ameet Satam’s letter opposing the allotments, saying it could affect the students of the institutes.Mhada recently gave the trust two plots, measuring close to 4 acres in total, in Juhu and DN Nagar in Andheri, and later BMC moved a proposal to allot another 12-acre plot in Andheri West. The civic body granted a six-month extension to the ‘validity’ of the trust’s bid to take over the 12-acre plot after it lapsed on Aug 1. Officials had earlier said that a bid is usually valid for six months and if the proposal is not accepted during that period, the tender has to be cancelled and a fresh one floated.In his letter, Patel credited Fadnavis with pushing for the allotments. “Your decision has been for providing sports and physical education facilities for the 30,000 students of SVKM NMIMS of Mumbai. The allocation has been done by the respective authorities after following the legal procedure and fulfilling the eligibility criteria. There is a complaint raised by MLA Ameet Satam for these allotments, which is not in favour of the students of SVKM NMIMS,” he said.Besides Satam, the allotments have been opposed by Shiv Sena (UBT) MLA Aaditya Thackeray and residents’ groups. The Gulmohar Area Societies Welfare Group and RTI activist Anil Galgani had earlier urged the CM to ensure that all three plots remained reserved open spaces and accessible to the public at all times in line with the Development Plan.Objecting to BMC’s plan to give the 12-acre plot to the trust at an annual rent of around Rs 21 lakh and a 50% share in revenue, Satam has said that floating a tender to allot a reserved open space under a public-private partnership mode when an open spaces policy for the city has not yet been finalised is completely illegal. He has demanded that the tender be cancelled immediately.
