114 acres land in Mumbai’s Borivali

A 114 acre land in Borivali area of Mumbai is being passed on to private builders for constructing IT/ITES project in the No Development Zone (NDZ) for a minuscule lease rental decided way back in 1950s. The land was primarily allotted for reclamation & cultivation purpose. Therefore, its lease rental was kept very low i.e. just one Pie per acre per year till 1960, and thereafter four Annas per acre per year. One Rupee is equal to 16 Annas or 192 Pies. So, it works out to be just Rs 1,858 in 75 years, this is what the state government would have got in all these years!

Moreover, the entire area comes under Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) and was within 50 mtr Mangrove buffer zone under CRZ 1A category. In addition, there are certain parcel of lands which are protected under “natural area” category (see Table at pg 5). One would assume that the primary purpose of allocating land was keeping these Mangrove buffer zone alive and “natural area” as it is or better it.