This is in response to the article by Abhay Pethe, Sahil Gandhi and Vaidehi Tandel (“Assessing the Mumbai Metro politan Region: A Governance Perspective”, EPW, 25 June 2011).
The Maharashtra government has extended the transfer of development rights instrument - a market mechanism originally used to provide public amenities - for constructing houses for project-affected persons. Data indicates that a majority of these townships have come up in a city ward where many of the poor live. In a situation where the real estate market is driven by the profit motive, unregulated use of the TDR has the potential to cause further fragmentation of already socially and economically segregated urban spaces.
