New CRZ rules clear coast for realtors

The real estate industry and the new Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) 2018 notification are all set to eat up India’s western coast, particularly the Konkan coastline. This means Goa and Mumbai might succumb to the intentions of this profit-driven industry. In December 2018, Union Minister of State for Environment Mahesh Sharma,in a written reply to queries on whether rise in sea level owing to global warming was posing a threat to Indian coastal villages, said, “The most vulnerable stretches along the western Indian coast are Khambat and Kutch in Gujarat, Mumbai, and parts of the Konkan coast and south Kerala. The deltas of the Ganga, Krishna, Godavari, Cauvery and Mahanadi on the East Coast may be threatened, along with irrigated land and a number of urban and other settlements situated there.” And then, within days, arrived the new CRZ notification that threw open the intertidal zone to the realty industry and caution to the winds. While realtors, who have been struggling to get clearances for coastline projects mired in environmental controversies, are enthralled, those in Mumbai, Goa and the rest of the Konkan region, who were seeking CRZ clearances and/or fighting with the National Green Tribunal (NGT), take it as a window of opportunity.