Back in power, Fadnavis’ first decision was to move metro car shed back to Aarey. Understanding the politics of it all

Soon after taking the oath, Maharashtra’s surprise chief minister Eknath Shinde and his deputy Devendra Fadnavis got to business. In the first Cabinet meeting on Thursday, the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government’s decision to move the Metro 3 shed from Mumbai’s Aarey was overturned. This was like rubbing salt on Uddhav Thackeray’s wounds, as the cause is close to his heart and was spearheaded by his son and Yuva Sena president Aaditya Thackeray.

Directing urban development officials to bring the proposal for building the car shed before the Cabinet, Fadnavis said that the Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ Metro project was stuck because of the legal problems over the Kanjurmarg plot, where Thackeray had proposed to shift the depot.

Also read: Warli tribe’s Save Aarey movement serves as beacon of community spirit and inclusive activism

The Bharatiya Janata Party’s comeback in Maharashtra is sweet revenge for Fadnavis and the latest decision on Aarey is a move significant in more ways than one. We take a look at the contentious project and why it has been a bone of contention between Thackery and his former ally.

The project and the controversy

The car shed for the underground Metro 3 rail project was proposed at Aarey, the 1,800-odd acres of verdant space in Mumbai’s suburban Goregaon, considered the city’s last green lung. The tussle between environmentalists and the state government over the shed has been going on since 2014.

In October 2019, authorities from the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited (MMRCL), a joint venture between the Centre and the state which is in charge of the project, cut down 2,656 trees in the area for constructing the car shed. The felling of trees was authorised by the Tree Authority of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation.

What followed was massive protests by residents and green activists who believe that Aarey needs to be saved in a concretised city like Mumbai. According to them, Aarey is an extension of the Sanjay Gandhi National Park and the Metro shed would lead to more commercial exploitation of the area.

The fight in court

The matter went to the Bombay High Court, which rejected pleas seeking a stay on tree-cutting at Aarey in October 2019.

As the ‘Save Aarey’ protests intensified, the BJP-led government Section 144 in the area. The Sena, which was part of the government, however, had opposed the felling of the trees, leading to a rift between the two parties. The case was heard in the Supreme Court which put an interim stay on the axing of trees in the Aarey colony, asking the state government to maintain the status quo. The MMRCL told the court had 2,141 of the 2,185 trees permitted to be cut down has been felled and 23,846 trees had been planted in their place elsewhere.

MVA’s big decisions on Aarey

In November 2019, there was a fallout between the BJP and the Shiv Sena after the Maharashtra Assembly elections over the chief minister’s post. The Sena joined hands with its former rivals the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and formed the MVA government. This was a big blow to Devendra Fadnavis, who believed he was backstabbed by Uddhav Thackeray.

Soon after becoming chief minister, Thackeray ordered that no more trees would be axed at Aarey. He also declared that the 600-acre land of the Aarey colony was a forest, excluding the construction of roads, slums, Adivasi areas, and government buildings.

In January 2020, the MVA government created a four-member committee to find an alternative location for the Metro 3 car shed. It said that there was no viable alternative for the shed and also rejected the possibility of using the marshy land at Kanjurmarg, an eastern suburb in Mumbai, which was proposed for the Jogeshwari-Lokhandwala-Vikhroli-Kanjurmarg Metro 6 line.

However, Thackeray ignored the recommendations and in October 2020 announced that the contentious Metro 3 car shed would be relocated from Aarey to a Kanjurmarg village. He also claimed that there would be no additional costs incurred because of changes to the project.

Angering the BJP

The change of location did not go down well with the BJP. Fadnavis said that his government had looked at the Kanjurmarg option but did not pursue it because of delays and litigations involved with the land.

In a series of tweets, soon after Thackeray’s announcement, the Leader of the Opposition defended the Aarey Shed and said that it was planned as a green facility, which would reduce carbon footprints. He argued that the shifting of the car shed will hamper the frequency of operations of both Line 3 and Line 6 and escalate the cost of the project by over a thousand crore rupees.

“ ‘-’ , - ,” he had tweeted.

𝐌𝐮𝐦𝐛𝐚𝐢𝐤𝐚𝐫𝐬’ 𝐛𝐞𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐲𝐚𝐥 𝐛𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐌𝐕𝐀 𝐆𝐨𝐯𝐭❗️
The idea of Mumbai Metro 3 CarShed at Kanjurmarg proposed by Hon CM Uddhav Thackerayji by integrating line 3 & line 6 is already rejected by the expert Committee set up by Hon CM himself!#MVAbetrayMumbaikars

— Devendra Fadnavis (@Dev_Fadnavis) October 14, 2020

MVA vs Centre in court The Centre filed a plea in the Bombay High Court challenging Thackeray’s decision to shift the car depot to Kanjurmarg, claiming that the proposed land belonged to its salt department. However, the MVA said that the allotted land was owned by the State.

In December 2020, the court stayed the construction of the car shed in Kanjurmarg. In April 2022, the HC told the Centre and the Maharashtra government to forget past conflicts and make a new beginning on the Metro 3 line project.

Additional Solicitor General Anil Singh said that the Kanjurmarg plot would have technical issues in future and recommended that the project be shifted to Aarey.

That is exactly what Fadnavis has done. The project is now moved back to the colony.

“Saddened by the new Maharashtra government’s move to relocate metro car shed to Aarey colony,” Thackeray said on Friday.

However, the saga over the Metro 3 car depot is far from over.

With inputs from agencies

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