Mumbai: The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Monday won a partial court battle as the Supreme Court (SC) lifted the status quo order on the Coastal Road work.
The engineers on site immediately resumed work, which had been on hold since April this year.
The apex court has referred the matter back to the Bombay high court to dispose. The HC had stayed the Coastal Road work after residents cited environmental damage and filed petitions.
The civic body argued that if work was stopped in between, the work that had already been done would go waste during the monsoon, leading to monetary losses.
The SC lifted the stay but did not allow further reclamation of land.
“The stay remains but the BMC can complete the unfinished work and that too, at the contractor’s risk,” said a petitioner Dr Nilesh Baxi, who is demanding that the Breach Candy interchange be shifted to an adjacent open plot.
Residents and activists are mainly protesting the reclamation of 90 to 95 hectares of land for the project and are also claiming that the BMC, itself, is not clear about the exact project design.
Meanwhile, the BMC immediately moved the machinery and started the remaining work at the Priyadarshini Garden site after the SC lifted the status quo order Monday.
