The Member of Parliament (MP) Arvind Sawant on Wednesday said that the Life Insurance Corporation of India's ownership of 92 properties (each having 10 buildings) located in Girgaum, South Mumbai is century-old and needs urgent redevelopment. "LIC by default has become the owner of these properties. The structures are more than 100 years old and residents are risking their lives. It's necessary that these buildings undergo redevelopment before any tragedy occurs." Recently, the MP also arranged a meeting with Mumbai Building Repairs and Redevelopment Board (MBRRB) an undertaking of MHADA. The LIC ownership properties also have cess buildings. In lieu of repairing these buildings, MHADA levies cess or repair tax on tenants and that is why these are called cessed buildings.
Sawant said, "The repair board usually alerts the landlords of cess buildings to undertake redevelopment if the buildings are not in repairing conditions. But here since LIC is the owner and central government is involved, MHADA cannot act. Therefore, I asked MHADA repair board to at least propose them (LIC) to carry out redevelopment."
Meanwhile, he asserted that several such central government-controlled properties are in bad conditions but the redevelopment of such properties cannot take place due to lack of any policy.
Vinod Ghosalkar, Chairman of MBRRB said, "We have asked LIC officials to either do a joint venture with MHADA and undertake redevelopment or let MHADA acquire the land by paying ready reckoner rate or they appoint an architect and carry out redevelopment by obtaining NOCs from the board."
