The Mantralaya makeover project, the subject of a debate between the Congress and the NCP, will go back to the drawing board, with PWD Minister Chhagan Bhujbal hoping to have it resurrected as two separate projects.The NCP leader said on Tuesday, “The total project stands cancelled. We will probably prepare two new projects. The project for renovation of the Mantralaya and the new administrative building will be funded through the state’s budgetary provisions.”
Other components might be taken up separately on a build-operate-and-transfer basis, he said. The existing plans include construction of a rest-house for dignitaries, an MLA hostel, political parties’ offices and six 60-storey towers to house ministers, judges and bureaucrats. “We cannot afford Rs 1,500 crore on our own,” Bhujbal said.
As per the PWD’s original plans, the developer was to invest at least Rs 1,100 crore; it would then gain by constructing on a four-acre plot at Nariman Point. The project was cleared by the state infrastructure committee in April 2008.
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