An overview of Fort area (Source: Express archive photo) An overview of Fort area (Source: Express archive photo)

From the Edwardian neo-classical stone facades of Ballard estate, the Victorian grandeur interspersed with Indo-Saracenic elements in Colaba-Fort area and the Art Deco era reflected in the buildings of Marine Drive and the few surviving single-screen theatres, Mumbai’s A-ward stands testament to being the crucible for various colonial architectural styles.

Yet, the BMC’s blueprint for the city for the next 20 years excludes much of the vestiges of colonial architecture from its land-use maps, with almost a third of the total 250-odd Grade I, II and II structures and heritage precincts been omitted.

Besides landmarks such as the Marine Drive precinct and old Town Hall, the draft Development Plan (DP) 2014-34 has failed to demarcate several other prominent Grade-I structures such as the Prince of Wales museum, Elphinstone college and the General Post Office, the Grade II Police Commissioner’s office and Capitol cinema and the Grade-III old Reserve Bank of India building and Radio Club.

A slew of buildings in the Fort precinct, mostly occupied by various banks and financial institutions, and several of the structures along Ballard estate have been left out. Religious structures of heritage value such as Mumbai’s oldest Anglican church the Grade I St Thomas Cathedral, the synagogue at Kala Ghoda and the four agiaries in Fort Colaba region have also not been included as heritage on the maps.

“The A-ward is the richest in inheritance as far as architecture is concerned. It has the densest concentration of heritage in Mumbai. The exclusions of all these structures is an anomaly that should be corrected,” said conservation architect Abha Narain Lambah who is involved in pushing for a UNESCO World Heritage Site tag for the Victorian Neo-Gothic and Art Deco Ensemble in the region.

The Mumbai Heritage Conservation Committee is now planning to raise the issue with the BMC commissioner along with a host of other heritage-related dilutions in the new DP and development control rules (DCR). Committee member Pankaj Joshi said, “The A ward is Mumbai’s most intact heritage core with great cultural and historical significance.

At a time when we are trying to notify it as a UNESCO world heritage site, the local mechanisms should aim to protect it from any kind of destruction; instead it has been made more vulnerable through the revised DP.”

The special DCR for heritage states that its provisions are applicable to only “Grade-II category of heritage… for reconstruction and redevelopment of buildings undertaken under these regulations”.

This not only exposes Grade III structures and precincts to the onslaught of redevelopment without the nod of the heritage committee, it also removes the hitherto protected grade-I structures from the purview of the panel.

Joshi said that as a result the 100-metre radius buffer zone around grade I structures, which is supposed to be left untouched, now stands scrapped making way for unrestricted construction around the landmarks.

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