MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Wednesday in an important order paved
the way for construction on vacant plots in five layouts under the
three-decade-old Bombay Urban Development Project (BUDP) at Versova,
Gorai, Charkop, Malwani and Mulund that fall within the 50-metre
mangrove buffer zone.
Hearing applications filed by Mhada and housing societies that had been allotted the plots in the late 80s and early 90s, a division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice Anil Menon, exempted it from a 2005 HC order that banned construction activities in the buffer zone. The court noted that the layouts had been substantially developed along with amenities and are located beyond an existing tarred road on the landward side. "The plots that fall in the 50-metre buffer zone but are part of an approved layout for which environmental clearance has been granted by the Union ministry of environment and forest, then it will be treated as falling in the Coastal Regulation Zone II," said the judges, adding, "It is clarified that when deciding on CRZ clearance, the Maharashtra Coastal Zone Management Authority will have to satisfy that the plot is beyond an existing tarred road on the landward side." The HC order will help other similarly placed projects, which had received environmental clearance.
They can now directly approach the MCZMA for approval. Bombay Environmental Action Group on whose PIL, the HC in 2005 had banned construction activities in mangrove areas in 2005, had contended that the plots fall within CRZ I, where no construction is permitted. They also sought that all buildings that had already been constructed between 1994 and 2003 when environmental clearances were granted be declared as illegal.
Hearing applications filed by Mhada and housing societies that had been allotted the plots in the late 80s and early 90s, a division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice Anil Menon, exempted it from a 2005 HC order that banned construction activities in the buffer zone. The court noted that the layouts had been substantially developed along with amenities and are located beyond an existing tarred road on the landward side. "The plots that fall in the 50-metre buffer zone but are part of an approved layout for which environmental clearance has been granted by the Union ministry of environment and forest, then it will be treated as falling in the Coastal Regulation Zone II," said the judges, adding, "It is clarified that when deciding on CRZ clearance, the Maharashtra Coastal Zone Management Authority will have to satisfy that the plot is beyond an existing tarred road on the landward side." The HC order will help other similarly placed projects, which had received environmental clearance.
They can now directly approach the MCZMA for approval. Bombay Environmental Action Group on whose PIL, the HC in 2005 had banned construction activities in mangrove areas in 2005, had contended that the plots fall within CRZ I, where no construction is permitted. They also sought that all buildings that had already been constructed between 1994 and 2003 when environmental clearances were granted be declared as illegal.
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