'Rs 1,000 crore scam': BJP MLA alleges irregularities in Mumbai Coastal Road project

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and Bandra West MLA Ashish Shelar on Monday demanded an SIT (Special Investigation Team) probe into the Mumbai coastal road project, alleging financial irregularities to the tune of Rs 1,000 crore. Addressing media, he said that the alleged scam took place between October 2018 and December 2018, last year.

He also asked Shiv Sena if the party was part of the alleged irregularities. "Has the scam happened with the blessings of the standing committee of the BMC? Was the Shiv Sena involved in it? The BJP will reveal the names of the contractors but the Sena must clear its stand first as the ruling party in the civic body," Shelar said.

In a Twitter post, he wrote that under BMC, Mumbai is on sale to the highest paying scamster. "While Mumbai faced lockdown last year, lakhs of tonnes of stolen, poor quality reclamation filling material was dumped in Coastal Rd site to defraud Mumbaikars," Shelar wrote.

Shelar also informed that he has written to the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM), formerly known as the Bombay Municipal Corporation (BMC), commissioner IS Chahal on the issues and demanded an SIT be formed to investigate it.

Shiv Sena refutes

Reacting to the development, Shiv Sena spokesperson Manisha Kayande said that BJP MLA should share proof of his allegations. She also claimed that the statement was just a strategy to defame Shiv Sena to defeat it in the civic polls. She further advised Ashish Shelar to question BJP corporators who were part of the BMC's standing committee.

Mumbai Coastal Road project

The Rs 12,000 crore Coastal Road project is an under-construction eight-lane, 22.2-kilometre freeway that would connect Marine Lines to Kandivali. The Coast Road is predicted to be used by 1.30 lakh vehicles daily and is expected to reduce travel between Western Suburbs and South Mumbai from two hours to 40 minutes. 

In the first phase, a 9.98-km stretch from Princess Street flyover to Bandra-Worli Sea Link is expected to be completed by 2023. In this stretch, the civic body is also constructing 2.07-km twin tunnels between Girgaon Chowpatty and Priyadarshini Park crossing under Malabar Hill and the Arabian Sea near the coast. The BMC has so far completed more than 40% work of the Coastal Road project.