'DNA' investigation: Govt squarely to blame for Dharavi project’s stillbirth

The government took no action against an agency contracted to complete the Dharavi survey that inflated the number of households in the area in its final report as well as outsourced a portion of its work to another agency with questionable scruples.

In October 2007, the government contracted the Maharashtra Social Housing and Action League (MASHAL) to conduct a plane table survey and baseline survey (BSES) of all slum-dwellers within three months at an estimated cost of Rs1.40 crore as part of the Dharavi Redevelopment Project (DRP).

DNA has copies of correspondence between the DRP and MASHAL from 2007 to 2008 that show the government was aware of the wrongdoing but did nothing except for mildly asking the agency to stop doing it.

“The inflated numbers would have led to more houses, which would have invariably gone to people close to these organisations,” Simpreet Singh, an activist with the National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM), said.

Singh has been associated with various slum projects for years.

Though the DRP officials periodically found huge discrepancies regarding the number of hutments in the MASHAL’s reports, the only action taken by T Chandrashekhar, the then officer on special duty (OSD), was to ask community development officers of the Project Management Consultant (PMC) to be present at the site of survey to monitor the numbering process.

DNA has a copy of the PMC’s letter, dated February 19, 2008, to the OSD, indicting the MASHAL for jacking up numbers. “PMC teams surveyed approximately 8,435 hutments and found errors in nearly 848 hutments. This accounts to nearly 10% of the hutments surveyed”, reads the letter. “You will observe that some errors are deliberate which raise several questions about the method in which the survey is done. Our observation is that this will result into [sic] severe problems for the government and the SRA and cause turmoil in Dharavi.”

And the PMC was not the only one to point out such discrepancies. The DRP and the SRP too said the same thing in their reports. In January 8, 2008, it was pointed out that the MASHAL had counted structures without roofs in its report. “Such structures should not have been considered for counting since it gives out a wrong signal to the public. As per DC [Development Control] regulations, Sharad Mahajan [architect and founder of the Mashal] is aware of what a structure means.”

In the next meeting on January 22, 2008, MASHAL was merely asked to be “cautious” during the numbering process. Though Mahajan gave his word that such instances will not be repeated, the minutes of meetings held in February and March talk of and records such “mistakes”.

Also, the MASHAL outsourced portions of the survey work to the Society for the Promotion of Area Resource Centre (SPARC) and its affiliates. DNA on Wednesday reported that the SPARC had a vested interest in opposing the DRP. Its director Joachim Arputham and members Sheela Patel and Sundar Borra were part of the Committee of Experts (CoE), which mooted an alternative plan to redevelop Dharavi.

The MASHAL put the names of SPARC and its affiliates, the National Slum Developers Federation (NSDF) and the DBA, in project-related drawings it submitted to the government.

At a meeting in November 2007, DRP officials asked the MASHAL not to put the names or the logos of any other agency on any document that it would submit to the government. Even the contract agreement between the MASHAL and the DRP said it “shall not sublet [sic] the work to any other person/agency”.

But the MASHAL, in its 12th progress report in January 2008, said that “over 50 volunteers of the SPARC/DBA are involved in the survey of various sectors in Dharavi”. The DBA (Dharavi Bachao Andolan) is a group of people from diverse political backgrounds with a common objective of using the DRP to gain political mileage.

In a paper titled ‘Getting the information base for Dharavi’s redevelopment’, the top brass of SPARC writes: “Although SPARC entered into a government-approved agreement with MASHAL to carry out the baseline survey in all of Dharavi, we were able to complete only around 11,000 surveys in Sector II. Since the surveyors were not attuned to the local situation, some were threatened by residents and had to be rescued by federation members.”

Going through the minutes of weekly meetings between officials of the DRP, the MASHAL and Slum Rehabilitation Authority, DNA did not find any such thing as “government-approved agreement” between the SPARC and the MASHAL.

Mahajan told DNA that Joachim Arputham, SPARC director, and his associates kept pressurising the then OSD T Chandrasekhar to include SPARC in the survey work. After some time, “Chandrasekhar directed us to include them”, Mahajan said.

He also hinted that the SPARC director carried out a sustained campaign, including feeding the media with stories that MASHAL was not competent enough to complete the survey, against his agency.

“But Chandrashekhar never signed any official agreement,” Mahajan said. “I was worried because my contract said I could not sublet [sic] the work to any other agency/person.”

An official reply from the SPARC, however, said Chandrashekhar wanted the agency to work on the survey along with the MASHAL. “He requested us to get involved and we did so with his full knowledge and approval. Chandrashekhar felt that SPARC would help smoothen the process of survey.”

The deal with the SPARC was fixed at an estimated cost of Rs24-30 lakh. “We had paid SPARC Rs2 lakh in advance for doing the socio-economic baseline survey.” Mahajan said his agency failed to meet the deadline because SPARC did not complete its portion of the survey.