The koliwada at Sion is all set to disappear from the city’s landscape. On Saturday, a day after the Bombay high court ordered that no action is to be initiated in any gaothan till it is demarcated, the BMC’s FNorth ward office issued 24-hour demolition notices to 56 hutments in Sion Koliwada. Also, the ward office issued show-causes notices to the old estate houses, asking why they should not be demolished. Gaothans and koliwadas are urban villages which are a relic of the city’s past, each having its distinct flavour. Assistant municipal commissioner of F-North ward, Gajanan Belale, said that the high court order does not apply to Sion Koliwada since it has already been declared as a slum redevelopment scheme. There is a government order to that effect and the demolition will begin on Monday, he said. Advocate Godfrey Pimenta said that the ward officer’s interpretation of the high court order is erroneous. Of the 189 gaothans across Mumbai, around 50 have actually been demarcated. Sion has a koliwada and a gaothan. The BMC must ascertain from the revenue department which is the gaothan and which part is the koliwada, he said. Pimenta added that in 2012, the municipal corporation had, while preparing for the Development Plan2034, appointed a consultant who advised the civic body on how to mark slum clusters and make a distinction from gaothans and koliwadas. The BMC merely has to implement that report, he said. It was in 1996 that the government declared a slum rehabilitation scheme in Sion Koliwada and since then the koliwada has been demolished in bits and parts, despite strong opposition from locals. Gaothans are settlements of the East Indian community, the original inhabitants of Mumbai. Gaothans have large houses with open spaces around them. Koliwadas have fisherfolk as their inhabitants. Most of these in the city are located along the coast. Koliwadas have pucca houses. Several inhabitants of Sion Koliwada were relocated here by the British after the Harbour line of the railways came up. Currently, though Sion Koliwada is not a fishing village, many of the womenfolk who live here sell fish. Rajesh Keni a resident who has been fighting against the Slum Rehabilitation Scheme said that what the BMC considers hutments are actually pucca houses. Just like in the other koliwadas, here too families expanded and in turn built their homes on open spaces in the koliwadas, he said. There are some encroachments too, but to call them hutments is grossly wrong. Sion Koliwada, which once stretched from the Sion Fort to Don Bosco in Matunga, is now restricted to 13 acres around the Sion circle. There are around 100 new houses which the BMC calls hutments, 18 large estate houses and the Agar Wada which has around 400 houses. These will now be gone soon, said Keni.
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