CRAMPED FOR ROOM ’s land woes

A PICTURE OF CONGESTION I n T h i s I s s u e The , and in the background the Ambassador About a Hotel, seen from atop the Hilton 2 Towers at . The story of Mumbai, its journey from seven sparsely inhabited islands to a thriving urban metropolis home to 14 million people, traced over a thousand years.

Land Reclamation – Modes & Methods 12 A description of the various reclamation techniques COVER PAGE currently in use. Land Mafia In the absence of open maidans 16 in which to play, gully Why land in Mumbai is more expensive than anywhere SUMAN SAURABH seems to have become Mumbai’s in the world. favourite sport. The Way Out 20 Where Mumbai is headed, a pointer to the future. PHOTOGRAPHS BY

ARTICLES AND DESIGN BY AKSHAY VIJ THE GATEWAY OF , AND IN THE BACKGROUND BOMBAY PORT. About a City THE STORY OF MUMBAI Seven islands. Septuplets - seven unborn babies, waddling in a womb. A womb that we know more ordinarily as the . Tied by a thin vestige of earth and rock – an umbilical cord of sorts – to the motherland. A kind mother. A cruel mother. A mother that has indulged as much as it has denied. A mother that has typically left the identity of the father in doubt. Like a whore.

To speak of fathers who have fought for the right to sire: with each new pretender has come a new name. The babies have juggled many monikers, reflected in the schizophrenia the city seems to suffer from. The Koli fishermen were the first to lay claim. From them possibly comes the present name of the city, derived from a shrine to the goddess Mumbadevi. The Kolis have survived unobtrusively in small pockets along the shoreline while the city has grown up, grown apart.

From the 6th to the 13th century, the islands served as home to several Hindu dynasties, most famously that of the Yadava king Bhimdev who made his capital at Mahikawati, familiar to us as . The Mohmeddans of Gujarat annexed the islands in 1343, bringing with them the beautiful Haji Ali Mosque and the religion of Islam. The Portuguese dropped anchor in 1508, and were quick to snatch the islands away from the Sultanate. They dubbed the deep natural harbour Bom Bahia – Good Bay. The islands were of little more utility to the Portuguese than as a weekend getaway, apparent The original Bombay archipelago, prior to the from their alternative name for the archipelago: A Ilha reclamations da Boa Vida, or The Island of Good Life.

In 1661, Catherine de Braganza, the Portuguese princess, married King Charles II of England and the main island of Bombay came to the British as part of dahej. After some initial Portuguese resistance, the British in 1665 took control over the other six islands of the archipelago, as well as the large northern island of Salsette. The city’s name was anglicized to Bombay. The name persisted for several centuries, till of course nationalist party - the , led by the demagogical Balasaheb Thackeray, came to power. Thackeray in a superficial quest for roots revived the nomenclatural battle, and the city has ended where it began, albeit a little bigger, a little larger. The city has stopped at Mumbai.

4 YELLOW | JUL - DEC 2007 GRANT ROAD

NAMED AFTER ROBERT GRANT, GOVERNOR OF BOMBAY FROM 1835 TO 1839, ONE OF THE MOST DENSELY POPULATED NEIGHBOURHOODS IN THE CITY. ALSO HOME TO – MUMBAI’S INFAMOUS RED LIGHT DISTRICT. First Birth Directors served him with a notice of suspension. Hornby, or so goes the legend, calmly pocketed the Mumbai as we know the city was born when the British notice and carried on with the implementation of his Crown leased out the islands to the scheme until he was forced to hand over charge to his Company at an annual “farm-rent” of 10 pounds, to successor. be paid in gold! The Company was headquartered at and was in need of a deeper port that would The Hornby Vellard, despite all the trouble that it allow larger ships to dock. Trade was booming and landed up poor Hornby in, provided Bombay with some Surat couldn’t cope. Bombay, with its naturally safe badly needed room for expansion. 400 acres of land harbour and strategic location on the western coast, were made habitable, and the city was allowed to was perfect. overflow its boundaries. Civic amenities were improved, a ferry service was commenced between The city began as a fortified outpost. Most of the Bombay and in 1776, new markets were built, population was concentrated on the main island of and the city’s drainage dramatically improved. The Bombay, in the area that we call now simply as Fort. precincts of Mahalaxmi, Kamathipura and were Work on the Fortification was initiated in 1715 by then settled. Reclamations and causeway building Governor Charles Boone, who also oversaw the continued apace. In 1803 Bombay was connected with construction of the St Thomas Cathedral, from where Salsette by a causeway at Sion. The comes the name (the battlements may name Sion comes from the Marathi have disappeared but the name has stayed). The word shinva, or boundary – Sion here harbour needed strengthening. The first Parsi arrived being the boundary between the to the city in the form of Lowjee Nusserwanji, a foreman islands of Bombay and from the Company’s shipyard at Surat, invited to Salsette. The Causeway Bombay to build war ships for the town’s defense. connecting Mahim and Much of the 18th century was spent in establishing was completed in firmer control over the island, and in repelling invading 1845 at a total cost of one- parties sent by the kingdoms to the north. and-a-half lakh rupees, donated entirely by Lady Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy under Coming of Age the precondition no toll be charged to citizens for its The city had begun to grow. The southern island of use by the Government. In Bombay was witness to a steady stream of migrants 1838, the Causeway from the hinterland who made their home within the linked Colaba and Old Fort area. The Englishmen lived in the southern part Woman’s Island in the east of the Fort while the Indian migrants organized to the island of Bombay. The themselves into colonies in the north. However, city was rapidly evolving increasing congestion compelled the Company to into one single fused land undertake the project of connecting the seven isles. mass. Mumbai was In 1782, William Hornby, acting as Governor, seemingly coming of age. commenced Bombay’s first real engineering project – the Hornby Vellard.

Near the northern base of in the area known as , there once stood a Great Breach that separated Malabar Hill from the northern island of . Hornby proposed to the Directors of the that the sea be shut out at its opening at Breach Candy, in order to make the low-lying land known as the Flats (ordinarily inundated during high tide) habitable. The proposal, costing an estimated one lakh rupees, was deemed too expensive and rejected. City myth says that Hornby proceeded with the project, unfazed by the refusal. 18 months before his tenure was to run out, the irate

6 YELLOW | JUL - DEC 2007 In the Prime of Youth However, the setting up of mills heralded the arrival of a vast new population. The island city needed more Once the seven islands had been connected there was room to house its people. The walls of the Fort held no stopping Mumbai’s transformation from trading the city handcuffed, as a result of which it was decided post to industrial centre. Better connectivity between in 1862 by Bartle Frere, Governor of Bombay, to the islands needed to be supplemented with better dismantle the battlements. Vital land in the very core links with the mainland. On Saturday 16th of April, of the city was freed up and made available for 1853, a 21-mile long railway line, the first in India, development. Other schemes were initiated by the between Bombay’s Victoria Terminus and Thane was Bombay Government to contain land scarcity. opened. Two more lines began operation in 1860 and Reclamations were carried out at Apollo Bunder, Mody a regular service of steamers on the west coast was Bay, Elphinstone Bunder, Mazagaon, Tank Bunder commenced in 1869. The earliest cloud of black smoke and the Frere reclamation on the eastern shore, and sent sailing across the city’s skyline in 1854 by the from Colaba to the foot of Malabar Hill on the western city’s first cotton mill was a quiet announcement of shore. this impending metamorphosis, abetted in no small way by significant historic events that happily The grandest of these schemes was proposed by the coincided in and around that time. Reclamation Company, which intended the reclamation of the entire portion of the Back Bay on The American Civil War began in 1861. The War lasted the western foreshore. The Company had been formed a total of five years, during which time ports in the during the boom years of the early 1860’s. However, southern American states were blockaded. America when the American Civil War ended in 1865, a was the English’s main source of cotton, and the depression set in and land prices fell. The company opportunity created by the gap in supply was grabbed went bankrupt and had to be liquidated. The at with both hands by Bombay’s cotton merchants. Government took over the task of completing the Raw cotton grown in Gujarat was shipped to Company’s projects but restricted itself to reclaiming Lancashire via Bombay, and several personal only a narrow strip of land wide enough to provide for fortunes were made during this period from the laying out the tracks from Churchgate station to resulting trade. The War Colaba. ended in 1865, and although there was a The Back Bay Reclamation fiasco though was only a temporary recession the minor trip-up. Nothing could really impede the city’s economy managed to march. Bombay was positively blooming, as was only recover, in part due to the too apparent from the importance it was being opening of the Suez Canal accorded by the Crown. No more was the city merely in 1869. By the turn of the a fortified trading town. It had become, during the decade, Bombay had course of its youth, a symbol of colonial power. become home to 36 cotton Mumbai had arrived. mills. The city had truly been set on the path to industrialization.

JUMA MASJID

ISLAM CAME TO MUMBAI IN THE 14TH CENTURY. THE JUMA MASJID, ONE OF THE CITY’S BIGGEST MOSQUES, LOCATED NEAR JAN -, JULWAS 2007 COMPLETED | YELLOW IN 1802. 7 MARINE DRIVE

THOUGH OFFICIALLY NETAJI SUBHASH CHANDRA BOSE ROAD, THIS MOST BEAUTIFUL THREE KILOMETER STRETCH OF ASPHALT WAS LAID DOWN AFTER COMPLETION OF THE BACK BAY RECLAMATIONS DURING THE 1920S. The Island City over the years: Notice the changing shape of the eastern and southern coastline. Also of interest is the manner in which the city has spread northward in an attempt to decongest its traditional heart.

Early Greys

Migrants continued to flock to the city, lusting for jobs Ambernath and Chapel Road in Bandra. By the early created by new building projects, a booming cotton 1930s, town planning schemes had been completed industry and flourishing trade with the West. A large at Bandra, Santa Cruz, , , , share of these industries that afforded employment Borivli and . Mumbai’s parade had in all to the city’s populace were crowded together in the earnest begun its march northwards. narrowest part of the island. Congestion was taking its toll. The demand for housing was initially met by Simultaneous with the Improvement Trust’s efforts private entrepreneurs who put up the first of Mumbai’s to spread Mumbai northward were the Bombay Port chawls. These single room habitations, occupied by Trust’s forays into the sea. The entire five to ten persons each, covered in the early part of area, all 90,000 square yards of it, was salvaged from the twentieth century about 75% of the city’s occupied the western foreshores of Colaba. Reclamation work houses. Naturally, chawls were commonest in the at Apollo Bunder carried between the years 1915 and industrial areas of , and Worli, in and 1919 gave the city land on which to raise the Gateway around the cotton mills. of India, and the adjoining Taj Mahal Hotel. The development of the Ballard Estate on the eastern coast From the very start though, supply was chasing entailed the conversion of 22 acres of sea-flooded demand. It was only a matter of time before the first foreshore into a consciously planned commercial slum mushroomed in some obscure corner of the city. precinct. The Ballard Estate not only decongested the Public health was on a downslide: the island town Fort area in terms of office space, it also assumed a found itself faced with regular outbreaks of influenza, symbolic role in representing the city’s mercantile small pox and cholera. The proverb: “Two Monsoons power in the early decades of the 20th century. The are the Age of a Man”, was seemingly holding true. second Back Bay Reclamation Scheme, despite all the What broke the camel’s back though was the outbreak aspersions that were cast by the media and the public, of the dreaded bubonic plague in September 1896. and justified though they were (the Back Bay Enquiry Mumbai’s grey hair were beginning to show. Committee set up in 1926 exposed serious blunders in financial calculations and raised grave doubts over To check the white from spreading across the city’s the credibility of the scheme), despite all the aging scalp, the Bombay City Improvement Trust was controversy and furore, the scheme in the end won formally constituted on 9th November, 1898. A need for the city a total of 439.6 acres of land, land which was felt to direct the expansion of the city towards now boasts of the city’s most beautiful stretch of road the northern suburbs of , , and - a three kilometer long promenade flanked by the Sion. Housing projects were commenced. An area of ocean on one side, lanky palm trees on the other, about 440 acres of low lying paddy fields in the Dadar smelling of salt and pickled childhood memories, a area was acquired for the scheme. By the 1920s the road that we know more simply as Marine Drive. city had swallowed up the suburbs of Kirol, , , Danda, Khar, Andheri, The city may have aged, but it had aged with grace.

JUL - DEC 2007 | YELLOW 9 Liposuction and Botox Liposuction and a shot of botox under those drooping Partition brought to the city Sindhi migrants from eyelids had evidently done the trick for now, though . Bombay’s belly swelled from 1.49 million in it was only a matter of years before time caught up 1941 to 2.3 million by 1951. The demand for housing with a seemingly laggard Bombay. peaked in the southern part of the Island. Former English properties on Malabar Hill and surrounding areas were sold and redeveloped into multi-storeyed blocks of flats by Sindhi and Marwari entrepreneurs. Two Sons Almost all property in the Dadar-Matunga area had been leased and built over. The neighbourhoods of The period immediately before and after independence Nagpada, Grant Road, and Dongri had witnessed the birth of the idea of developing land already achieved densities that the rest of the city is across the harbour. The idea, first mooted in 1945 by crumbling under today. If infrastructure were the belt Foster King, a member of the Indian Institute of round the city’s waist, then Bombay was about to be Architects, wished to decongest the city by moving caught with its pants down! industries to the peripheries of Greater Bombay and through the creation of a new township at Bassein The fat needed redistributing; it was time to turn to (). The idea gained greater currency through the the woodlands in the north. The new suburbs of 50s, and the lethargy of the various official committees Bandra, Khar, , Santa Cruz and Andheri came notwithstanding, culminated in the publication in into being. Bungalow villas sprouted where there once 1964 of a Development Plan of Greater Bombay, and stood forest. Sports clubs, gardens and playgrounds a few years later of a Regional Plan for the larger were developed by local citizens. Housing societies Metropolitan Region of Bombay. flourished. Shacks and cottages were built to serve as weekend retreats. “History was created when in The Regional Plan emphasized the need to discourage October, 1932, the enterprising JRD Tata landed his industries from locating in Bombay. Furthermore, it Puss Moth on the inaugural flight of Tata Services proposed a ban on office space in the Fort area and from Karachi to Bombay. The memorable event marked suggested that commercial activities be located in new the genesis of India’s national carrier, Air India.” As centers like the Bandra-Kurla area in the suburbs. air traffic increased, a new international terminal was Recognizing the nature of the exploding city, the plan built at Santa Cruz, replacing the . made a case for a ‘multi-nucleated Metropolitan The core city was becoming increasingly dependent Region’ with many separate new towns which would on the suburbs. Recognition of the fact came officially take pressure off Bombay from the mass distress in the form of the Greater Bombay Laws and the migration that had manifested itself in the 1960s and Act of 1945, which stretched was projected to continue for the next few decades. municipal limits to include the boroughs of Bandra, Parle-Andheri and Kurla together with 42 villages in the Bombay suburban district.

CENTER ONE MALL,

NAVI MUMBAI HAS BLOSSOMED INTO A PROSPEROUS CITY, ACCOMMODATING GLOBAL CONSUMPTION ICONS SUCH AS MCDONALD’S AND NIKE IN SHINY NEW MALLS SUCH AS THIS ONE. The authors of the Regional Plan - , the potential of the old city to rejuvenate itself. The Pravina Mehta and Shirish Patel - in their new city was not helped by the fact that the State recommendations gave prominence to King’s idea of a Government never did move to New Bombay, thus ‘Twin City’ on the mainland across the harbour from depriving it of the very catalyst that was supposed to the old. The starting point for this idea was the already spur its growth. Poor transport links between the planned extension of Bombay’s port at Nhava Sheva. mainland and the island city didn’t aid the cause There were also two industrial zones, Thana-Belapur either. The reclamations of the 60s and 70s at Nariman and Taloja, for which housing and ancillary services Point exacerbated the problem to the point that by would in any case have to be provided and the Thana 1991, had a population of 600,000, Creek Bridge was also under construction. The idea on which their proposal hinged though was that of scandalously low when compared with the 2 million the State Government moving to New Bombay. By targeted by the Regional Plan. getting the Government to shift office the intention was to kick-start the city’s growth, as also to get people Politics had played spoilsport. Nariman Point had to commute on an east-west axis instead of a north- stolen Navi Mumbai’s thunder. For a myopic State south axis. Government in the 70s, it seemed easier to place related commercial activities across the road rather On the mainland then was built the world’s than across an entire bay in New Bombay. Successive largest ever planned city, spanning committees appointed by the Government post- an area of about 344 square Independence had warned against completing the last kilometers, integrating 95 villages leg of the Back Bay Reclamation scheme. The spread over the districts of Thane Government turned a blind eye and proceeded with and Raigad. The City and the reclamations. To make matters worse, the Development Corporation, or development plan of 1964 had recommended a high CIDCO, was established by the FSI of almost 4 for the area. The result was a bouquet Government of in March, of some 40 skyscrapers that had sprouted on a measly 1970, specifically to plan and manage the twin city of New Bombay. 77 acres of land at the southern end of Marine Drive According to the plan proposed by at Nariman Point. Nariman Point had become the CIDCO the new city was to comprise family star, exceedingly tall and in the pink of health, 20 nodal settlements built along major while there lay Navi Mumbai in a corner, weak and transport corridors and to have an neglected, by itself - the bastard child of a promiscuous ultimate population of 2 million. The government. intention was to distribute the existing population between the old and the The railway link between and Vashi, new city and also to absorb additional completed in 1992, has been the crutch that’s allowed migration. the new city to stagger back to its feet. Today, Navi Mumbai is flourishing, boasting a per capita income However, the precise relationship considerably higher than that of old Bombay. It has a between the two and their dynamic commercial node at Vashi accommodating administrations was never outlined or global consumption icons such as McDonald’s and clearly understood. The Regional Plan Nike. It is home to a sizeable fraction of Bombay’s had no vision for ‘Old Bombay’, and its middle class. Once better links are established with role vis-à-vis the New Bombay, and this the island city, there is no stopping Navi Mumbai’s ambiguity in the relationship frustrated rise.

The battle for attention between its two sons has come to symbolize the crux of Bombay’s problem. The island city needs to be decongested. The vacant mill land might be the lungs that allow South Bombay to breathe again. The city’s future lies in the east, on the mainland, with Navi Mumbai. The trans-harbour link currently under construction is proof that the Government has learnt its lesson. A Navi Mumbai International Airport is in the pipelines. The Central Business District of Belapur continues to bloom. The future seems promising.

Maybe the family’s ready to welcome back the dark horse to its stable - a family reunion to buy the head of the family a peaceful funeral. Y

Information courtesy Bombay: The Cities Within by Sharada Dwivedi

JUL - DEC 2007 | YELLOW 11 MODES & METHODS

That Mumbai desperately needs land is a gross understatement, and it is a combination of geographical constraints, historical reasons and economic factors that are obliging the city to look towards the sea for a way out of this particularly congested corner.

he act of raising the level of land which is either reclamation to circumscribe land scarcity would be just below or adjacent to water is known as land Singapore and the low-lying Netherlands. Treclamation. Each country has its own favoured mode of practice. Mumbai, as was discussed in detail Singapore undertook its first reclamation as early as in a previous article, employs fill material excavated the 1820s, but reclamation only really picked up after from mountains to bury the sea under. Small hillocks Singapore attained autonomy in 1959. The first deemed expendable by the people-in-charge are razed reclamation schemes employed rubble obtained by to the ground, making way for level land that can be digging up hills, but growing concerns for the ecology exploited more profitably, and the rubble obtained is have since prompted authorities to employ alternative used to extend the coastline that crucial meter beyond. materials, primarily sand dredged from the ocean floor. Prominent among countries which have relied on

H O W S I N G A P O R E W A S W O N F R O M T H E S E A

STEP ONE

Singapore has relied heavily on reclamation to satiate its people’s appetite for land. Singapore is a small city-state, just one-and-a-half times the size of Mumbai, that began as a humble fishing village. Increasing urbanization and a steadily growing population has resulted, since the 1960s, in the reclamation of some 100 square kilometers of land, and a plan to reclaim an equal amount over the next thirty years. Reclamation has literally redrawn Singapore’s coastline. Large areas have been straightened by the construction of dykes across estuaries, swamps lying between the city-state’s 63 islands have been filled up and the coast has been extended significantly on the When Sir Thomas Raffles acquired Singapore from the Sultan of Johor in eastern and western fronts. Between 1961 and 1991, more than 5400 hectares 1819 on behalf of the East India of sea was swallowed by the tiny country. Company, Singapore was no more than a fishing village spread over 63 islands.

12 YELLOW | JUL - DEC 2007 Dredging literally means digging up the sea bed. It is slippage of under-consolidated clays, which can cause an important way of obtaining sand and gravel for instability, and erosion must in any case be checked. construction and reclamation works. The dredging The coastline is under relentless attack in the form of process consists of excavation, transportation and waves from the sea. Waves pick up energy and utilization. Excavation entails the dislodgement and momentum from near-surface winds blowing across removal of sediments from the bed of the water body. vast expanses of uninterrupted ocean. Most of this The dredged material may then be transported in self- accumulated energy is dissipated near the coast in a contained hoppers of the dredgers, via barges, or it narrow zone known as the surf zone. The breaking of may be pumped through pipes. Finally, the excavated the waves in this zone produces turbulence that results in the mobilization and suspension of material could be utilized as fill, or as construction sediments. The breaking waves also create near-shore aggregate. For instance, dredging may take place in currents that flow across the coastline, and in the the middle of the ocean but the dredged material may process transport massive quantities of sediment. have to be transported to near-coast areas where reclamation is being carried out. Hard-engineering structures are built along the coast to preclude erosion and movement of sand along the There are limitations to the amount of land that can coastline. Structures designed to prevent erosion of the upland are generally bracketed under the category be reclaimed in a feasible and viable manner. of coastal armouring and include seawalls and Singapore is a case in point. In its nascent years revetments. The other types, the kind that impede reclamation work was carried out at relatively shallow sand movement, include groynes and breakwaters. depths of 5-10 m. With increasing forays into the sea the situation now demands reclamation be carried at Seawalls protect the upland by preventing wave depths deeper than 15 m, meaning greater costs. There attack. They are most often vertical walls made of is also a need to preserve existing navigation channels timber, concrete or steel-sheets that form a protective front against incident waves. Mumbai has extensively and sealanes. Land reclamation must not be at the used seawalls, or bunds, to cut out the land from the expense of port activity, which is why planning new sea, and filled it up with either dredged material or schemes is such a tough balancing act. rubble from mountains. Interestingly, seawalls have been used to protect nuclear reactors built on artificial Reclamation isn’t merely drowning the sea in an ocean islands against submergence. of dirt. The fill needs to be compacted and cemented to impart it the requisite strength to bear the weight Revetments are shore-parallel structures used of structures that will be built upon it. The fill site commonly to contain erosion. The structure is needs to be protected from mass movements or designed to create wave breaking by causing waves to

STEP TWO STEP THREE STEP FOUR

The East India Company wished to convert The razed material was dumped into With better connectivity between the Singapore into a trading post that would act shallow mangrove swamps which islands and the mainland in mind, the as a link between Europe and China. The were subsequently drained, and thus Johor-Singapore Causeway was conversion entailed some amount of was born the entrepôt town of constructed in 1923 connecting reclamation. Rubble for the fill came from Singapore. Singapore to Malaysia. A second road razing hills in the locality. link has been added since to reduce congestion at the Causeway. lose energy when they impinge the shore. This is done at a fair distance away from the coastline. A breakwater through both the reflection of waves and by turbulent can either be submerged or emergent, depending upon dissipation of the wave energy. The design consists of whether it rises above the surface of water or not. No two or more layers of stone with the upper, larger amount of searching will ever reveal a breakwater in stones providing stability against wave attack. The Mumbai. The city is oblivious of the concept, and this stone sizes must be graded to ensure that the lower, ignorance is well-explained. Mumbai is a natural smaller stone does not wash out through the upper harbour. The port has deliberately been developed on layers. Typically, the stone is underlain by a geotextile the eastern face, the leeward side, in such a way that fabric to prevent the base sand on which the structure the seven islands fused into a single land mass act as is built from washing out. Geotextile fabric is in an improvised breakwater. Other reclamation methods essence a filter paper with a much finer pore size. that deserve mention would be those that employ groynes, dikes, artificial headlands and jetties. Offshore breakwaters are similar to revetments in that they aim to preclude erosion by limiting the As of today these are probably the most practiced, amount of wave energy that reaches a coastline. But and possibly the most successful techniques in use. unlike revetments, they are built parallel to the shore But knowing man’s capacity for innovation, who’s to say what the morrow may herald. Y

H A R D E N G I N E E R I N G S T R U C T U R E S

A groyne is usually a vertical barrier built perpendicular to the coast, extending offshore, constructed to control the sand deposition pattern on coasts with significant alongshore

GROYNE movement. The groyne causes accumulation of sand on the updrift side while resulting in erosion on the downdrift side.

A breakwater is built seaward, parallel to the shoreline, at a distance from the coast. Typically it consists of one long continuous strip of artificial land, but occasionally it may be built as a series of multiple offshore breakwaters separated by small BREAKWATER gaps, as is the case along the Kaike Coast in Japan.

Revetments are shore-parallel structures constructed to limit landward erosion. They generally consist of stones, asphalt, or as is the case with Marine Drive, concrete tetrapods placed on a

REVETMENT slope at the foot of the coast face.

14 YELLOW | JUL - DEC 2007 G O I N G D U T C H

DIKES

The case of Netherlands stands up as a sterling example of land reclamation. The Netherlands is an averagely small European nation that lies at the mouth of three great rivers – the Rhine, the Maas and the Scheldt – that empty into the North Sea. Two-thirds of the nation’s land is situated below sea level. Consequentially, much of the Dutch landscape is a result of human intervention, An oft-recited local saying goes, devoid of which large parcels of land would be “God made the world, but the Dutch permanently submerged. made the Netherlands.”

The earliest of the country’s inhabitants lived along creek ridges, and constructed rudimentary mounds to which they could retreat with their livestock during periods of flooding. With a more highly developed social organization from the Middle Ages on, the Dutch adopted more elaborate means of protecting their lands against water. Water-control boards were formed which undertook construction of a system of dikes (earthen walls) to hold back the water. With the aid of windmills they drained the enclosed tracts of land and took measures to ensure that they remained permanently dry and available for farming. These lands reclaimed from lakes or the sea are called polders.

Polders initially encompassed small areas, but now reclamation techniques have been extended to larger areas. Immediately after the polders are pumped dry, the muddy bottom is sown with reed by aircraft. Reed strengthens the surface, making the polder accessible by foot and motorized vehicles, as well as assisting the formation of arable soil. Trenches and canals are dug for drainage to keep the polder permanently dry. The land thus reclaimed is utilized mainly for cultivation, Windmills, used extensively in Holland to drain reclaimed land, have become part of the country’s landscape but the creation of artificial lakes and beaches has lent them some recreational value as well.

JUL - DEC 2007 | YELLOW 15 Sixty percent of Mumbai’s population lives in slums while 600 acres of land in the very heart of the city lie undeveloped. More than a hundred thousand people find themselves compelled to sleep on decrepit street pavements every night on an empty stomach while a decapitated government machinery chases itself in circles to ensure for itself a full belly. The city has one of the nation’s highest per capita income levels yet a majority of its citizens are forced to wallow in such shameful indigence. Why?

rchaic laws, corrupt rates, resulting in evictions all Another reason for the scarcity of politicians, an inefficient across the city. The Act was an land in Mumbai is the Urban Land A administration and a essential piece of legislation that Ceiling Act, which places a limit of powerful builder’s lobby are why stipulated a tenant could not be 500 square meters as the maximum land prices in Mumbai are the evicted as long as he continued to size of plots that can be sold in highest of anywhere in the world. pay his rent, and that the right to urban areas. Any land in excess of In this article we look at how these live on could be inherited by family. that will be redeveloped by the State four factors have conspired to for the poor. The act also prohibits induce land scarcity when there The Act guaranteed permanence of the use of residential areas for should have been none. residence to a large number of the commercial purposes. The Act was city’s citizens. But that was back implemented during the Emergency Land Regulations That Serve then, some sixty years ago. No of 1976 with an intent to Nobody government has since had the redistribute resources by taxing the political gall to do away with what rich and using the money to fund Acts that were put into place in a is quite clearly an irrelevant housing for the poor. In Robin Hood different era with a different purpose regulation in these times. argot - to steal the rich people’s land in mind have lingered on as bad Consequentially, families have and distribute it amongst the memories and worse. The Rent stayed on in their ancestor’s plush destitute. Control Act, implemented during bungalows on Cuffe Parade paying the Second World War, put a freeze not more than a few hundred rupees What has happened instead, as is on rent levels which seemed then a month for property that would easy to guess, is that the rich have to be on a never-ending upward easily fetch a thousand times more bought the right to hold onto their spiral. An unforeseen demand was on the open market. The tenants are land. Corruption has proliferated, created by the arrival of a large unwilling to let go of such priceless and exemptions to the Act have been number of British soldiers fighting tracts of land, and this is preventing paid for in typical fashion - under in the Second World War to the reentry and subsequent the table. Even worse though is that Mumbai, who were willing to pay development of some prime real large parcels of land are being held substantially more than current estate. on to by private trusts that are

16 YELLOW | JUL - DEC 2007 Mumbai has an average population density of 28,000 persons per square kilometer. New York City has a density of 25,000. The tallest building in Mumbai is the , a residential complex built in the vicinity of Bombay Central, which measures up to a grand height of 161 m. Buildings in NYC taller than 161 m number one hundred and forty three! reluctant to sell because they fear European capitals of and YOU SAID IT R K LAXMAN invoking the Act. As a result, London. There is no city more valuable real estate is once again bridled by the topography of its Taken from being held back from the market. surroundings than Mumbai, and yet the authorities continue to persist In addition to these there are Floor with an incomprehensibly low Space Index Restrictions. Floor average FSI of 1.33 for residential Space Index (FSI) is the maximum areas. The highest in the city is 2, area of floor space that can be built in the Bandra-Kurla complex. on one unit of land. Cities that are Compare it with New York where the geographically constrained tend to highest FSI in residential areas is rely on a high FSI to provide housing 15. for their citizens, which is why there is such an abundance of FSI restrictions first came into place skyscrapers in New York City and in the 1960s. The city was struggling Hong Kong, and a seeming dearth to keep pace with the population, of the same in the more spread out and infrastructure was beginning to show the strain. The Act was conceived to contain congestion by inducing an artificial land scarcity Source: Census of India that would push up land prices. High land prices, the government thought, would discourage people from coming to the city. But much 2001 to the government’s disappointment Look, one of those satellites hanging about there! 1991 the migrants didn’t stop coming. A Are you sure you are not an unscrupulous builder city like Mumbai in a third-world who has violated FSI? 1981 country like ours is a magnet that draws in people from the rural 1971 hinterland in the thousands on a 1961 daily basis. Most arrive with empty pockets. They sleep on the 1951 (in millions) pavements for most of their lives,

0123 and if they’re lucky they get to die in a one-room chawl. That is the Migrants into the city Population Increment ineluctable tragedy of the abject in Fig 1 Migration’sFig 1 Migrant Contribution Inflow to a land that offers limited Population Growth opportunities.

Like all laws this one too has a Migration into the city peaked in the 80s, but notable sub-clause. Higher FSI can has shown signs of decline over the last two be bought in return for developing decades. Migration contributed 36.8 per cent to low-cost housing, through what are total population increase over the period 1991- known as Tradable Development 2001. On an average, 42 families come to the Rights (TDRs). TDRs are an city every day in search of livelihood. “A migrant important source of state revenue. to Mumbai is typically a male villager in his Money earned from TDRs in the twenties. Most often, he is illiterate. Nearly 22% period 2003-2005 was used to fund of these migrants are child labourers.” (Times of the construction of 55,000 free India report, 28 Dec 2006) housing units for slum residents, a point that we return to later.

JUL - DEC 2007 | YELLOW 17 (in millions)

Total Population Number of Slum Dwellers

Fig 2 ’s Slums Source: Census of India

While Mumbai’s population has grown steadily over the last 40 years, so have the city’s slums. What is of interest is that both have grown almost at the same rate - total population increased by nearly 7 million persons, of whom only 1.8 million have been fortunate enough to escape the city’s sprawling slums. In other words, three in four people who have entered the city or been born in it after 1961 have passed their life in a slum.

The Coastal Regulation Zones that it shows concern for our (CRZs), marked out by a legislation wetlands and mangrove forests, but passed in 1991 which restricts it has virtually brought to a halt all development on land affected by the reclamation work and rendered tide, compound the problem. impossible any scheme that aims to Rent to Income Ratio with Mumbai as Base 100 Rent to According to the legislation, redevelop the city’s port. Much of Mumbai is divided into three zones the area under CRZ II and CRZ III Tokyo Sydney

on the basis of ecological sensitivity. is highly built land falling within the Seoul Taipei Jakarta Bangkok Singapore

New construction is prohibited in municipal limits of the Island City Mumbai CRZ I. Construction is only and is of vital importance to Lumpur Kuala permitted on the landward side of business. Constraining roads in CRZ II, and that too at a development in these areas impedes minimum distance of 50 meters the city’s economy - a city that Fig 3 Property Rates and Per Capita Income from the sea. In CRZ III areas, contributes 40,000 crore in taxes construction is allowed only after an every year to the national treasury. approval has been obtained from the Property rates in Mumbai are among the highest State Ministry. An Ineffective Administration in the world. This has led to the emergence of speculation and hoarding in real estate as one of CRZ I encloses a small fraction of Combine all these regulations with the more lucrative forms of investment. the city’s land that has been deemed an over-bloated and lethargic Consequentially, while thousands of flats lie particularly sensitive, and it is bureaucracy that takes anywhere vacant in wait for the right price, a million people generally agreed upon by all that between 90-180 days to sanction continue to sleep on the street. these stretches needs to be building approval and it’s no protected. However, it is the CRZ II surprise that there’s such scarcity and CRZ III areas that exemplify the of land. Mumbai is being strangled judiciary’s predilection for by red tape and its citizens are projecting India as a first-world merely looking on, either too country in matters of the disenchanted or too powerless to do environment and the ecology. Ours anything. The government lacks the is possibly the only country in the courage to rescind the Urban Land world that has laws that protect the Ceiling Act, or remedy a clearly entire length of the nation’s defective Rent Control Act. A coastline. The CRZ is admirable in bankrupt municipality can’t afford

18 YELLOW | JUL - DEC 2007 From 2003-2005 TDRs were used to fund the construction of 55,000 housing units given free to slum residents. The figure is about equal to 3.5% of the number of slum dwelling families as identified by the government. Going by historical data, if we assume the number of slum dwellers increased by 1% p.a., it works out that the number of subsidized units just about matches the increase in the number of slum dwellers. In other words, the absolute number of people living in slums has (thankfully) not increased, but nor have the TDRs been successful in bringing the number down. to develop the requisite Fig 4). Where then is the incentive infrastructure that a higher FSI to develop these lands? would call for. The powerful builder’s lobby has bought for itself The city needs to get past its sufficient political leverage to ensure socialist hangover. We’ve tried Source: Charles Correa (2005) that land prices continue to rise, as public planning rather bizarre as it may sound. And the unsuccessfully for sixty years. It’s State isn’t exactly overeager to time we admit it doesn’t work. normalize land valuation as is Rather than taxing builders with overtly visible from its disinclination social responsibilities, we need to be to abolish the practice of TDRs. giving them incentives. If over the TDRs are disincentives for builders, next five years a million housing and doing away with these may units can be added to the market, prompt the entry of new players into not wholly unachievable, land prices the real estate development market. will automatically retreat, and a That though is unlikely to happen decent house that one may call anytime soon seeing that the State home may still become affordable for itself relies on high land prices to a fair majority of the city’s fund development schemes such as population. those undertaken by the Slum Rehabilitation Authority. These Mumbaikers pay a considerably schemes appear superficially to be greater proportion of their earnings pro-poor - it is indeed hard to believe for considerably worse housing. The free housing could be of detriment amount of land isn’t increasing, and to anyone. But scratch the surface neither are FSIs. What is happening a little and it becomes apparent that though is that the average per capita the money for these schemes comes land size holding is going down. In from obliging some nine million simpler terms, more people are Fig 4 Idle Public Lands people to live in a one-room unit or being squeezed into the same worse. amount of land, and we have come Idle public land lying either with the Bombay Port Trust to share this city not even 500 or private mills or the Railways adds up to 2152 acres. The government needs to normalize square kilometers in area with The McKinsey Report ‘Vision Mumbai’ estimates land land valuation by deregulating the fourteen million others. If the supply could increase by 50 per cent if the administration market and increasing land situation is to improve, the city were willing to swallow a few hard pills: increase FSI to availability. When the cost of needs to rid itself of these an average of 3-4, relax CRZ II & III, and rescind the developing idle land exceeds the regulations stuck to its flesh like Urban Land Ceiling Act and Rent Control Act. benefits, then the policy blood-thirsty leeches intent on environment has effectively halted sucking every vein dry. In the the development process. 500 acres meanwhile though, watch where of closed port land and almost 600 you put that foot of yours. You don’t acres of land belonging to 25 want to be treading on somebody bankrupt and long-closed mills are else’s toes. Y rotting in the heart of the city (see

JUL - DEC 2007 | YELLOW 19 TT hh ee

onsider this the next time you’re standing on dictates of topography, abetted by some naive choices Marine Drive, with your face turned to the sea, of infrastructure projects. Ccool wind fingering your hair: A single square foot of land at Nariman Point costs twenty thousand Mumbai is a peninsular city bordered by the Arabian rupees. Twenty thousand: slightly less than what the Sea in the west and south, and in the average Indian makes in an entire year. Twenty east. The city began as a small fortified outpost thousand: slightly more than what the average functioning from the southern tip of the peninsula. engineering graduate starts on for a monthly wage. North was the only direction that offered room for Twenty thousand. That’s precious real estate you’re expansion. Matters were not helped by the standing on. For free! construction of a suburban rail network oriented along the same cursed north-south axis. In a city where an Who in this manic city doesn’t dream of a visiting card astounding 85 percent commuters rely on public that reads xyz, Marine Drive? And yet, the collective transport, the impact of such a choice is profound. desire of a few million for office space on Marine Drive Moreover, government offices too are located in the won’t allow it to happen. Marine Drive is only three south, as a result of which most business activity is kilometers long - only room for so many people. also concentrated in the region. In the absence of east- west linkages, is it any wonder that Mumbai has come This pattern of spatial development along a to follow this “mono-centric, linear pattern of growth”? predominantly north-south axis, with commercial activity squeezed at the southern end, and residential To state the obvious: this isn’t exactly the best spatial and industrial areas spread across the northern organization Mumbai could have chosen for itself. A suburbs, has been the bane of Mumbai’s existence. look at San Francisco, a city similarly constrained by Most cities typically grow radially, branching out in its topography, reveals what Mumbai did wrong. If a several different directions at once. Mumbai’s city is to spread across a body of water, there must be abnormal arrangement is not borne from some sufficient linkages between both sides. San Francisco perverse desire for experimentation, but rather by the boasts of four east-west linkages with the mainland in addition to the Golden Gate Bridge across the strait

B L U E P R I N T

Mankhurd-Vashi rail link opens, bringing the northern part of Navi Mumbai into closer 1973 contact. The neighbourhoods of Vashi and 2008 Belapur witness tremendous growth.

The Regional Plan makes a case for a ‘multi- Bandra-Worli Sea Link, the first leg nucleated’ city with separate centers to relieve of the Western Expressway, opened pressure off the island city. The Plan proposes 1992 to public use. the development of a twin city across the harbour from the old, to be called New Bombay. WW aa yy OO uu tt

joining San Francisco Bay with the Pacific Ocean. Vashi rail link. The southern half however, has Mumbai at present has only two crossings from the remained largely undeveloped, principally due to the mainland, both of them too far north to relieve any absence of quick communication with and easy access pressure off the island city. to the island city. Seen in this light it is easy to understand why the proposed trans-harbour link is In addition, most of the world’s larger metropolises so imperative to Mumbai’s continued growth. essentially function as conglomerations of two or three cities. The Greater Tokyo Area comprises of Japan’s The Trans-Harbour Link was first mooted in the three biggest cities: Yokohama, Tokyo and Osaka. New current Regional Plan for the years 1996-2011. The York and Philadelphia too share this symbiotic Plan aims to set in motion an “irreversible process of relationship. San Francisco has Oakland to its east, spatial decentralization”, calling for development of across the Bay, and San Jose to the south. And don’t new centers of growth and addition of better transport be conned into thinking that Philadelphia is in any linkages between these centers. The idea is to help way subordinate to New York, or Osaka is riding piggy- Mumbai move from a “mono-centric” to a “multi- back on Tokyo and Yokohama. The nature of the nucleated” model. South Bombay will of course remain relationship is far from parasitic. Oakland is home to the dominant center, but central business districts USA’s fourth largest container port. San Jose is also (CBDs) will be developed at other areas to share some known as Capital of Silicon Valley. of the load. The Bandra-Kurla Complex (BKC) is well on its way. The Belapur and Vashi CBDs have taken Mumbai too tried the strategy with Navi Mumbai. Navi off in recent years courtesy of the Mankhurd-Vashi Mumbai was first conceived in the Regional Plan of link. Through the construction of a Trans-Harbour 1973. It failed to take off due to reasons that were Link, the same could be achieved for areas in and mentioned in a previous article: poor linkages with around the Nhava Sheva Port. The potential of the the mainland, failure of the government to shift office region becomes clear when the following fact is taken across harbour, and the Nariman Point reclamations. into consideration: the southern half of Navi Mumbai The scenario improved dramatically for the northern has 2500 hectares of fallow land that can potentially part of the new city after completion of the Mankhurd- be used for housing. Once the link is complete,

The Trans-Harbour Road Link, connecting south Navi Mumbai to the Island City, completed. Second phase of the Western Expressway – the Worli-Nariman Point Sea Link – also finished, marrying the CBDs of Nariman Point and the The Trans-Harbour Rail Link completed Bandra-Kurla Complex. The first corridor of the Mumbai 2012 - a happy denouement to the proposed Metro begins operation. integration of Mumbai and Navi Mumbai.

A second international airport built at Navi Mumbai, to lighten traffic at the 2010 Chatrapati International 2015 Airport. commuting time to the island city will come down to between the two cities much like the kind shared by an hour-and-a-half. Thus, Nhava Sheva could well Yokohama, Tokyo and Osaka. The success of this plan supplant the neighbourhoods of Thane, and hinges upon the success of the Trans-Harbour Link. the Vasai- corridor (regions that have shown large A high toll rate could well be a deathblow. Hafeez population growth over the last decade) in their role Contractor suggests an alternative, vis-à-vis Mumbai. “to reclaim land from the sea off the east coast The grand design is to ultimately integrate these five of Mumbai, which will link up to the mainland. regions: Nariman Point, BKC, Vashi, Belapur CBD and This solves many problems at one go: it creates Nhava Sheva (see map) through the completion of some 3,400 acres of land for us to build houses world-class infrastructure projects. The Bandra-Worli upon, and creates a lake, which after three Sea Link (BWSL) currently under construction and monsoons will be a fresh water lake that can the Western Expressway are two very important links serve Mumbai’s need. So we will have a lake in the chain that the Plan envisages forging – a chain next to Mumbai, fed by three rivers, which at that will shape the city into a pentagon of sorts, with present just disappear into the bay. each node acting as an engine for greater economic growth. The Western Expressway would be a 15 “Moreover, by linking Mumbai to the mainland kilometer 8 lane expressway that will run along the through the reclamation and the making of a shoreline from Worli to Malabar Point, and then across dam, the trans-harbour link that has been the bay to Nariman Point. When complete, the planned and which is going to cost us billions expressway, in combination with the BWSL, will act of rupees, is created for no cost. Also, since the as a direct connect between BKC and Nariman Point. mainland is easily accessible, that makes The project is expected to reduce commuting time from available more land to meet Mumbai’s growing the southern end of Mumbai to newly developed job needs. centers in the suburbs by at least a half hour. Proposed bus lanes along the entire length of the Expressway “And finally, when the government sells the would ensure that it serves low income groups as well. reclaimed land, it can earn up to Rs 120 billion, The is another attempt at improving which can be used as seed money to upgrade east-west connectivity. There is also a plan to develop infrastructure in the city.” a second international airport for the city across the harbour, to absorb part of the air traffic currently The proposed plan calls for reclamation of a very large borne by the Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport. area. The ecological consequences of shutting off Thane Creek and converting it into a fresh-water lake These grandiose projects are admittedly consistent could well be disastrous. A technical study of the with the government’s agenda to decentralize the city consequences of such a reclamation has not as yet and thereby relieve some of the pressure off its been carried out. The government is reluctant to traditional heart. The sole source of concern is the pursue such a course of action since the reclamation proposed financing of these projects, particularly the would be in direct conflict with the Coastal Regulation Trans-Harbour Link and the Western Expressway. The Zone Laws. The political risk is high, the plan as of now is to recover costs though the charging administration doesn’t wish to risk facing the of tolls, and this is of worry. Tolls would almost environmentalists’ ire. No government will even certainly be self-defeating for a bridge whose purpose consider it. is to distribute people and jobs from a place that is over-crowded to a place that is less crowded. Past The plan as it is on paper sounds perfect. The city experience stands up in support of this point of view. gets land (and fresh water), the government gets money Revenues from the NOIDA freeway near Delhi have (lots of it). In the end a direct land connection between been, at the very least, disappointing. Reason: traffic the is fashioned. Contractor is very counts are not meeting projections thanks largely due optimistic, “… this idea is so simple and solves so to a hefty toll. In this context, the proposed toll of Rs many problems at one go that nobody will believe me.” 100 for a one-way commute across the Trans-Harbour It would indeed be a pity if a project that promises so Link would almost certainly debilitate the much was never even explored. administration’s vision for Nhava Sheva. Is anybody listening? Y There is widespread consensus that the city’s future lies in the East and South-East, along the Mumbai- Excerpts taken from Rediff Interview with (October corridor. The aim is to foster a relationship 29, 2003)

JUL - DEC 2007 | YELLOW 23 E d i t o r ’ s P a g e

My loyal chair to which I owe this aching back. Breathe. The crowd’s louche body

A bottle of cold water tasting mildly fizzy. Deck of cards clings and parts in place, an ovation for a game of 29 on a lazy afternoon. An XXL-size ash rigid and adrift, alive. It is the sea tray and a pack of cigarettes to get through the night. that sweeps the sea. Broom tight with inner bickering. Laptop on which most of this magazine was made. A box of dry fruit that came from home - lasted an entire A mortal scour. Meaning, day, it did. All Out to drive away the mosquitoes. Wish how the crowd hates the crowd. there was something to drive away my equally Outwardly. It admits you or me pestilential equally ravenous wing mates! as an enormous lidless eye admits glittering Foooootball! beams. Endless watching, washing us in. My humble eight square meters of land in this crowded The crowd’s object, its point, city. Mine for now, mine for a year. Or maybe not; with reservations set to be enforced next semester, is always vanishing into its own mass. It is a sea and the number of students expected to increase by a with no concern for us, even as it scores. third, who knows with how many I might be sharing this little piece of land that I fancy thinking of as mine. From Crowds Surround Us by Tom Thompson

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