PUNE: The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has started the procedure to acquire land for Bio-diversity Park (BDP) after the State government took a decision to give eight per cent Transfer Development Right (TDR) compensation to landowners. They have begun by acquiring government land as private land owners are not happy with government’s decision concerning the compensation.
Last month, the State government took final decision to give eight per cent Transfer Development Rights (TDR) as compensation to Bio-Diversity Park Plan (BDP) landowners in merged 23 fringe villages and issued a notification on the same. Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis accepted the recommendations of the committee led by District Guardian Minister Girish Bapat to give Transfer Development Right (TDR) as compensation.
After one month, the civic body has decided to acquire government land first which they get easily. Out of total 978 hectares land, 125 hectare land comes under forest department. In the total BDP area, there is around 200 hectares of illegal construction. More than 70,000 illegal constructions are spread mainly in Wadgaon Budruk, Warje and Hingne area. The PMC faces a big challenge to clear illegal constructions on Bio-diversity Park (BDP) area. However, the PMC doesn’t know how much encroachment has been done on government land. It will be a big challenge for the civic body to remove encroachment in BDP areas including government land.
While speaking to media, Saurabh Rao, Municipal Commissioner, said, “We have decided priority of BDP land. We will take government land which came under BDP reservation. We will send a letter to government to hand over land to the civic body for BDP. We will secure this land first and then go to private land.”
After 23 fringe villages were merged with the city in 1997, the PMC made a draft Development Plan (DP) of 23 villages and submitted it to the State government for final approval on December 12, 2005. According to this, the civic body reserved biodiversity area after considering rapid urbanisation, destruction of forests and hills for construction of buildings and roads. In 23 merged villages’ Development Plan (DP), the corporation had proposed and reserved total 978 hectares. It is spread over seven hills in 12 villages.
