It seems that the policy on rooftop restaurants in the city has been caught in a political crossfire between BJP and Shiv Sena.

The civic Improvement Committee on Wednesday, for the second time in a row, shot down the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation's (BMC) proposal to allow rooftop restaurants on high rises, citing several loopholes in the policy.

Even the BJP didn't support its ally Shiv Sena in the civic House in clearing the policy, in a way contradicting the latter's grand plans of enhancing the city's nightlife by letting all pubs and restaurants operate night-long. Yuva Sena chief Aaditya Thackeray last year had brought the idea to keep the city open all night.

The move comes as a huge setback to several restaurants that have been waiting to set up eateries on their terraces. On Tuesday, Samajwadi Party scion Farhan Azmi had met improvement committee chairperson Ujjwala Modak to discuss the issue, even though Modak denied discussing on the policy with Azmi.

BJP's Prakash Gangadhare, a committee member, snubbed the policy, saying it is against the city's 'culture'. "The policy doesn't take into consideration the inconvenience that it would cause to residential societies around the restaurant. We had objected to the policy last time too, on the same grounds, but the civic body had not amended the policy before bringing it before the improvement committee," he said.

Sena corporator Raju Pednekar said, "Currently, so many rooftop restaurants are operating in the city illegally. If the policy was cleared, the BMC could have earned revenue from them. Police protection and other security issues would have been eventually taken care of," he said.

Improvements Committee chairperson and BJP corporator Ujjwala Modak said, "The policy has been rejected and we haven't decided on any future course of action as yet."

However, despite Modak's non-committal stand, BJP group leader in the BMC Manoj Kotak said, "The policy was shot down in the larger interest of the public. The policy can be applicable in commercial areas and business hubs but not in residential areas. We will ask the BMC to re frame the policy on those lines."

BEST buses in civic budget

The BMC standing committee on Wednesday formally approved the civic budget of Rs33,517 crore for 2015-2016. However, while approving the budget, the committee members gave their suggestions to include provisions worth Rs500 crore in the budget without increasing the total amount of the budget.Some of the provisions suggested by the corporators include a provision of Rs100 crore to be allotted to BEST as financial aid to buy 300 extra buses.

DP discussed with experts"Our experience with no-development zones have been bad. We haven't been able to protect them." That was municipal commissioner telling a group of activists and city experts, who assembled at the BMC head office on Wednesday to debate and discuss the city's development plan 2034.

Kunte was responding to Bandra activist Anil Joseph's query on why the BMC had decided to open up Aarey colony area, the last green lungs of the city, to development.

"Most of such NDZs have been encroached and eventually taken over by different elements such as land mafias and slums. To protect the Aarey land, we have opened it to development of theme parks and institutions, to protect them from being taken over and to make them accessible to public."

He added, "As per the existing development control rule 60, theme parks, Amusement parks, transit tenements can be constructed in NDZs."