At the town planner’s office at CBD Belapur, the first day of hearings for NAINA, the Navi Mumbai Airport Influence Notified Area, are underway.
During a break between hearing sessions, two planners for NAINA say that the government pays less money, but it has more work. “In a company, it’s all about money. Here, it’s about people,” one of them says.
There are eighteen police constables at the back of the room to protect the planners up on the raised stage from people who’ve come to complain. The hearings are over the initial design of NAINA, a territory spread over 561 square kilometres around the Navi Mumbai airport. From the planners’ view, their plan will organise growth around the airport area.
Land owners and small builders have a far more dire view.
At the lectern, NAINA’s public relations officer gets a few words in when the crowd of villagers jump out of their chairs and begin shouting at the planners. The police and NAINA’s guards quickly form a barrier between the agitators and the officials. The mass slips into itself, throwing up a new bunch of protestors, and the police stand close to them, uttering a word here and there, gently guiding people who get too close. Men in plainclothes come forward with pursed lips and a hard look; one stands out, tall, lean, stone-jawed, an eyebrow split by a deep scar. He reasons with the crowd first, head down, hands in surrender, and then stands back to take in each protestor. The glowering villagers come close, but the look on these mens’ face creates a barrier on its own.
Later, after the villagers from Nere have calmed down, erupted again, and walked out, one of the senior planners on stage wipes his glasses and says, “They want to give us a sense of their opposition. If they say it mildly, we will not hear them. So they said it loudly. There’s nothing serious about it.” An officer from the intelligence bureau later says he followed the protestors down, and watched them laughing. “It’s all acting.”
In the next hearing, villagers from Belavali bring their lawyers. A young advocate, Mhatre, clears his throat and reads from a stack of hand-written sheets. He’s unsteady. An older man beside him corrects him every few sentences. NAINA’s planners watch him without a word. Notetakers write down minutes.
This is more civil. None of the fiery pronouncements from this morning.
There are simple declarations that say more than an hour of shouting. An older advocate in blue sneakers rises and tells the planners, “Do you agree that people have not received notices from NAINA? Not one person received notice [of this hearing].” V Venugopal, the additional chief planner at NAINA, listens to this impassively. He prefers peace over chaos, and says there will be enough time to hear everyone. The plan can still be changed. “This is a democratic process.”
“This is a big project for us,” Venugopal tells them.
The old lawyer bats it back. “For us too.”
Venugopal smiles, and says his Marathi is poor.
The meeting ends. Everyone in the room knows this is only the beginning. Whatever is to happen under NAINA will take years. The storm will come later.
