Mhada serves 1,200 notices to push redevelopment projects

Mumbai: The Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (Mhada) has so far sent around 1,200 notices to various developers and societies in Mumbai, in a bid to acquire stalled redevelopment projects on their plots.
In December 2022, Mhada was empowered to take over the project on its own plot if there was a failure by the developers and residents to submit any proposal to redevelop the residential building, irrespective of the reasons behind the failure including disputes and litigations. This was enabled after amending the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Act, of 1976. Prior to this amendment, the landlord was the owner where the building stands and Mhada’s role was limited to approving repairs and redevelopment of the building.
“Since the amendment, so far, we have served about 850 notices under Section 79(A), another 300 under 79(B) and 70-80 under 91(A),” said Sanjeev Jaiswal, vice president and chief executive officer, Mhada said while addressing a gathering at CREDAI-MCHI’s Redeveloping Mumbai exhibition at Bandra Kurla Complex.
The Act’s Section 79(A) permits Mhada to serve notice to the owner or landlord of the cessed building to submit a redevelopment proposal along with 51% consent within six months from the notice issue date. In the case of section 79(B), after the landlord’s or owner’s failure to submit a proposal, the occupants or tenants of the building are asked to submit a proposal within six months to undergo redevelopment. 91(A) pertains to incomplete or delayed or non-starter redevelopment projects within three years from the issue of the No Objection Certificate (NOC).
Jaiswal also urged the real estate industry not to derail the project by offering higher sops to the residents as compared to the developers who are already onboard. In multiple cases, it has occurred that the housing societies sign up with the developer providing more carpet area and corpus fund, and the already onboarded developer not budge resulting in litigation. This in turn leads to the structure getting weakened further and the residents suffer eventually as it gets stalled.
In south Mumbai, there are over 14,000 cessed buildings of which over 13,000 are yet to be redeveloped and NOC has been issued to rebuild nearly 4,000 buildings. Including for South Mumbai, the state government has been encouraging residents to go in for cluster redevelopment as compared to standalone projects.