Mumbai: It's BJP vs BJP over parking policy in Colaba

Parking has caused a rift within the Bharatiya Janata Party BJP pitting a Member of Legislative Assembly MLA against a party corporator Colaba MLA Raj Purohit has taken up the cudgels to support citizen demand to roll back the BMCrsquos recently passed parking policy which proposes a fourfold hike in parking chargesMLA Raj Purohit claims local residents approached him and asked him to help them oppose the new payandpark policyThe partyrsquos group leader in the BMC Manoj Kotak however feels the plan is good for Mumbai For a week Purohit has been protesting in Colaba against the policy which asks citizens to pay 300 per cent more for parking their vehicles on the road outside their residential societiesIn fact he even approached Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis with his complaints instead of contacting Kotak who represents the party in the BMC Kotak has also not made any efforts to get in touch with his former boss Purohit is an exchief of Mumbai BJP ldquoColaba Residents Association is opposing itThey contacted me and told me lsquoThis is injustice You are our MLA and hence we approached you The BMC never took us into confidence about this policyrsquo This is a democracy and the BMC should have contacted advanced locality managements ALMs and NGOsrdquo Purohit saidAsked why he didnrsquot approach Kotak he said ldquoThis was the civic commissionerrsquos decision and he never informed any MLA This payandpark policy will lead to goondaism I met the CM and briefed him about the situation He has asked the minister MoS Urban Development Ranjit Patil to look into itI will meet the CM tomorrow Wednesday again I went to the commissioner also This is an administrative issue not a political one Why should anyone else be contactedrdquo According to the policy parking lots will be auctioned to contractors who will then collect parking charges Purohit feel this will lead to goondaismldquoIf there is an auction it will involve muscle power especially when it is related to payandpark This will lead to mafia raj and they contractors will start making their own rules The roads belong to people and they are parking their own cars The BMC should instead remove encroachments from footpathsrdquoLongterm stepOn the other hand Kotak claims the policy is for the good of Mumbai ldquoTill date we havenrsquot received a single letter from Raj Purohit nor do we have any information If there is some issue that is concerning citizens we will reopen the proposal and think on it A few locals may have approached him Purohit because he is a public representativerdquoAdvocating for the policy he added that it would help decongest the cityrsquos roads since there is no uniformity in parking ldquoSomewhere we have to settle for a policy if it is made for future convenience For example in USA citizens pay 60 per hour for parking Finding this expensive people there use public transport like trams and busesBMCrsquos policy will give citizens right to park their vehicles near their residential premises Earlier commercial outlets and visitors mostly used the space available near residential areas When a policy which is going to affect the city in the long term comes into effect resistance is expected from a section of citizensrdquo he said