mid-day Opinion: Prevention is better than demolition

The demolition drive near Bandra railway station may have become Mumbairsquos biggest talking point this week Still Bandra is hardly the only part of the city struggling with encroachments and illegal structures Almost every part of suburban Mumbai today carries the burden of unchecked occupation of public spacesAlong Link Road LBS Marg and even highway service roads public spaces have slowly disappeared under illegal extensions stalls garages eateries marriage halls used car dealers car washing centres and roadside businesses Roads have narrowed footpaths have vanished and congestion has become part of everyday life for ordinary MumbaikarsMumbai perhaps needs a return to the ldquoDemolition Manrdquo era of GR Khairnar when illegal constructions and encroachments were treated as a serious threat to the city instead of being ignored year after yearThe controversy around the Bandra demolition is therefore much bigger than one locality or one demolition drive It reflects a larger urban reality that Mumbai has been living with for decadesFor years illegal structures and extensions have grown openly across Mumbai while enforcement remained weak selective or completely absent Footpaths meant for pedestrians are occupied by stalls and temporary structures that later become permanent In many areas people are forced to walk on busy roads because public walkways barely exist anymore Hawkers occupy entire stretches eateries extend beyond permitted limits and commercial establishments gradually take over public land without fear of consequences Even spaces around water supplying pipelines of Mumbai nullahs and other critical public infrastructure have faced encroachments over the yearsWhat makes the problem worse is that none of this happens secretly Every Mumbaikar already knows which roads have become narrower which junctions remain permanently congested and which public spaces are illegally occupied Citizens experience it daily while travelling to work walking to railway stations or simply trying to cross roads safely But in many cases authorities fail to act for reasons best known to them The problem is not a lack of visibility The problem is delayed actionThat is why the Bandra demolition has triggered strong reactions across the city Many ordinary citizens feel Mumbai is becoming increasingly difficult to navigate because authorities have allowed encroachments to grow unchecked for decades At the same time demolitions after years of silence also become politically sensitive and emotionally charged Once illegal settlements or commercial encroachments become permanent realities every demolition naturally leads to conflict court cases and heavy police deploymentThe larger failure therefore is not demolition itself The larger failure is allowing violations to become permanent before taking action The same authorities that fail to stop illegal occupation in the beginning later arrive with bulldozers and present demolition as strong governance But demolition alone is not governance Prevention isIf authorities act immediately when the first illegal structure appears situations rarely reach this stageMumbai also no longer has the excuse of lacking tools or technology Earlier authorities often blamed a shortage of manpower or difficulties in monitoring large areas But today CCTV surveillance satellite mapping Google Maps and digital monitoring systems make it easier than ever to identify illegal extensions blocked roads and encroachments on public landMonitoring public spaces is no longer as difficult as it may have been in the 1980s or 1990s Yet enforcement still appears reactive instead of preventiveThis inconsistency damages public trust Citizens begin to feel that rules are enforced only after court intervention media attention or political pressure Violations continue openly for years without consequences creating the impression that public land can be occupied freely until authorities suddenly decide to actMumbai deserves better than governance that wakes up only during crises A city of this scale cannot function through delayed reactions and temporary cleanup drives Public spaces belong to everyone not to whoever captures them first and holds on long enough Roads footpaths and railway surroundings are basic civic infrastructure not spaces that can slowly disappear under unchecked occupationThe Bandra demolition should therefore be seen as more than just a local controversy It is a reminder of how Mumbai slowly allowed civic disorder to become normalMumbai needs more intensive demolition drives across the city But but more importantly it needs consistent enforcement before encroachments become permanent realities That was perhaps the real message of the ldquoDemolition Manrdquo era not simply demolishing illegal structures but creating a system where violations were not allowed to grow fearlessly in the first placeSanjeev Shivadekar is political editor midday He tweets SanjeevShivadekSend your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper