Over the following two weeks, the Mangrove Conservation Cell will formally receive 1,014 hectares of mangrove property. JNPA (previously JNPT) is donating 815 hectares, whereas MMRDA is donating 199 hectares.
Only MMRDA land with actual mangroves will be taken over, according to Mangrove Cell chief Virendra Tiwari. Salt pans, CRZ plots set aside for recreation, school, and police station, and creeks are also part of the MMRDA’s territory.
Several hectares have been set aside for metro construction. According to NatConnect director BN Kumar, JNPA still needs to account for 100 hectares of mangroves. The area is the same as ten Azad Maidans.
The state decreed in 2005 that any encroached land owned by the government will be liberated and given over to MMRDA for protection.
The Bombay High Court ordered that all mangrove land be handed over to the Forest Department for conservation in 2018. Delays in the procedure have been criticized by activists.
According to Nandakumar Pawar, the head of Shri Ekvira Aai Pratishthan, the JNPA’s environmental record is not remarkable.
He noted that the port and its contractors have indiscriminately destroyed wetlands, recalling that JNPA was fined by an HC-appointed panel for destroying mangroves for a container terminal.
NatConnect’s Kumar pointed out that vast stretches of mangroves have been buried even for JNPA SEZ. He said that mangroves that had been delisted had yet to be taken over, and that the CM had requested the environment department to look into it.
