When Development is Not Progress : The Young India

Kartikey Sehgal

The Inorbit Mall (near the traffic) and the buildings: Built on untreated garbage

Development is an umbrella term that hides many truths. It assumes the status of progress and many times this assumption is kept out of the periphery of observations.

A common social and political rhetoric states that Mumbai is progressing. It implies that buildings are erected over slums, without any relocation or other plans for the slum dwellers. Thereby, the seeds of class conflict are sown.

One important progressive area of Mumbai is the stretch between Goregaon and Malad and it houses the well-known Inorbit Mall and the Mindspace complex that hosts several IT companies and BPOs. There is something special about this place.

It is built on a dumping ground. Generally that’s how all buildings are constructed; something is uprooted or destroyed and the foundation of a new building is laid. However, it seems that a part of this reconstruction process was avoided by the K Raheja Group, that constructed the mall and the complex.

A background to the construction should shed light on the real nature of development.

“I would never walk near the dumping ground on which they have made this mall. Now I am a very frequent visitor to the mall. But this place sued to be a mess earlier”, recalls a resident staying here for twenty years.

Complaints were lodged against the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) that used this area as a dumping ground. It acquired the plot in 1968 and for up to thirty years, 1000 tonnes of garbage was thrown here daily. This is the background of progress. The foundation.

Thirty years of dumping garbage in an area that was largely made up of trees and marshland but still hosted some residencies.

“The area smelled, of course and windows had to be shut at all times”, says the resident whose grouse then was not just a complaint. The ‘smell’ that she is referring to is toxic smell. Capable of giving you daily illness. In thirty years the garbage was untreated. Residents complained but nobody paid heed to them. “There were lesser residencies then”.

And then in 2002, the plot was closed for dumping following orders from the Supreme Court of India. It had been realised that the plot could no longer take 1000 tonnes of garbage daily.

The BMC gave the plot to Ivory Properties, part of K Raheja Group. What can you possibly build on a marshy land? So they had to cover it. The garbage from the plot was used as a leveller; the marshy land was filled up. The Mindspace complex and the Inorbit Mall were constructed. The garbage remained untreated.

The development of this area, then, is not an act of progress but bad business sense, assuming that the builders and the BMC would be held responsible for possibly endangering the health of residents. Because in all probability, the air is filled with toxic methane and hydrogen sulphide.

Progress was never on the mind of the city-makers as can be observed from photographs (below). The area is still populated by illegal slum-dwellers, who, according to a local resident, “would consider the price offered to them before thinking of relocating”. The green patch of land is possibly a part of the marshy land that was filled up with untreated garbage. Some more residential complexes are in the offing. The traffic is terrible.

Finally, the water that you see behind the mall and the buildings is not a river. At least that’s what people say. It could be a nallah although it resembles a creek. It still stinks, especially in the monsoons when it is filled with water. It is perhaps the most distinctive reminder of the murky politics of development.

More reading: TOI

The Mall (forward) and the 'Creek'

Progress reconsidered

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The Young India

When Development is Not Progress

on April 25, 2009

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