Mumbai demolitions get Sonia's nod

Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh today said the demolitions in Mumbai would continue but only slums that had come after 2000 would be removed. He was talking to reporters here today after an hour-long meeting with Congress chief Sonia Gandhi.

At this meeting Gandhi obviously batted for Deshmukh.

Mumbai Regional Congress Committee chief Gurudas Kamath had meetings with Ahmad Patel and Margaret Alva, party general secretaries, yesterday. Deshmukh's arrival in Delhi means the issue could not be sorted out at the level of general secretaries.

The issue is to balance the superlative performance of the Congress in Mumbai in the Assembly elections, held less than a year ago, against the damage that removing encroachments could cause in terms of votes.

Interestingly, the Shiv Sena, main opposition party, has supported the government's action in removing encroachments from around 160 acres of land held by the Airports Authority of India (AAI) on the ground that encroachers are all Bangla-deshis any way and require to be deported immediately.

But it is the Congressmen representing Mumbai city ""like Murli Deora, whose son Milind Deora won a convincing victory in the last Lok Sabha elections, Sunil Dutt, MP from Mumbai (north-west), and Kamat himself, who are concerned at the damage the drive against encroachments could cause.

Civil Aviation Minister and Nationalist Congress Party (which is a Congress ally in the government) leader Praful Patel has pleaded that unless the land is freed from encroachers, the Santa Cruz Airport could face a major security problem.

He and Deshmukh have argued that it is not just the poor who have encroached on the land, but also the rich whose illegal houses are being demolished as part of the drive.

This is designed to counter the argument that the government's policies are anti-poor.

What did cause the stir was a statement by Margaret Alva two days ago when she went to Mumbai and said removal of encroachments would create a waterway all right, but the only people who would gain would be those who could afford to travel on it.

The discourse has now shifted to alternative resettlement of the slum-dwellers.

Today another party general secretary, Ashok Gehlot, added his voice to the clamour of opinion in the Congress against the demolition. He said the Congress needed to take a stand on demolitions that it was not anti-poor, as such a perception was growing.

"The recent slum demolitions in Mumbai has created such a perception," he said at a programme organised by the Maharashtra Youth Congress in Mumbai.

"After demolitions in Mumbai, the message should be that the Youth Congress is worried about the people", he said adding that injustice should not be meted out to anyone.

"Volunteers need to take a stand and only then will the people be with you," Gehlot said adding "if you do not help them in their need, they will not forgive you."

He said Youth Congress volunteers should have issued statements in media and met the chief minister to convey their sentiments on the demolition drive. Deshmukh has been reminding his own party ""which is a divided house on the issue "" that it was Prime Minister Manmohan Singh who said Mumbai must become a city of the class of Shanghai.

It is likely that he and his detractors ""Kamath and others "" will sit together to formulate a resettlement plan for the poor and some sops for them.