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Maharashtra allocates 5 acre of Aarey land to construct police station


Maharashtra allocates 5 acre of Aarey land to construct police station
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Almost two years ago when the current Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government came to power, one of the first decisions they took was to announce that the Metro Car Shed 3 will be moved out of Aarey. This was seen as a big positive by the environmentalist that had been fighting for the "Save Aarey" movement. 

Hence it comes as a big surprise that the same government is now allocating five acres of Aarey land for the construction of a police station. The plan is to construct to Aarey Police Station on this land. 

Talking to Indian Express, Additional Commissioner of Police (North) Dilip Sawant said, “The current police station is in an old bungalow near Chhota Kashmir and it is in a very bad condition. The new plot is located close to the existing police station.”

Following this move, the dairy development department has said that the land on which the old police station should be handed back to it.

Commenting on this development a senior government official said that the project was sanctioned as per instructions passed by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on December 28, 2020.

This move has irked the green petitions that have been working on saving the forest in the Aarey Milk Colony. 

Mumbai’s Aarey Milk Colony, with its 1,300 hectares of forest land, is called the ‘last lung of Mumbai. It was in the news for the last two years for the tree felling in the area as there were plans to construct a metro shed for the Metro 3 line. However, now the plan has been put on hold and it is proposed that a metro shed will be constructed at Kanjurmarg. 

Aarey forest is an 800-acre forest that was developed as a Milk Colony.

Proposed by Ramon Magsaysay Award winner Dara N. Khurody, the Aarey Milk Colony was brought into existence in 1949. Then-Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru officially inaugurated Aarey by planting a sapling there in 1951 – he believed he was ‘planting the future.’

Read all about Aarey Forest here.

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