A bead of sweat snakes down 44-year-old Rupesh Patil’s creased forehead as he scans a government notification. His restless gaze shifts abruptly from the still waters of Chirner Lake to the pastoral horizon of the historic village. The lake is near Maharashtra’s 17th-Century Maha Ganpati Temple, and the area is known for its gadhegals — two ancient stones representing land-grant.
Chirner is among the 124 villages on the outskirts of Maharashtra’s capital, earmarked for the Third Mumbai project. “Ha navin prayatna ahe amchya jameeni hadapnyacha ani udyaogpatinchya ghashyat ghalnyacha. Kay garaj ahe, jameen ghenya aiwaji development karana. Malki amchich rahudya [This is the third attempt at grabbing all our lands at low prices and putting them in the laps of big conglomerates, contractors, and agents, who are manipulating farmers to sell],” says Patil.
He re-examines Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA)’s notification from October 2024. It announces the appointment of the New Town Development Authority (NTDA) as the Third Mumbai project’s special planning authority. The 323-square-kilometre project, also known as Karnala-Sai-Chirner Navanagar (KSC New Town project), is spread across Pen, Panvel, and Uran talukas (or tehsils) of Raigad district.
Chirner falls in the Uran taluka. On June 7, hundreds of people gathered in the village to protest, raising slogans to amplify their demand for fair compensation. Three days earlier, the Maharashtra Government had approved the appointment of Singapore-government-owned urban planning consultancy Surbana Jurong Group to prepare a master plan for Mumbai 3.0.
The villagers affected by the potential land acquisition are banded together in MMRDA KSC Navnagar Virodhi Samiti, a resistance group formed in April 2025. Their worry has roots in what they say is the Maharashtra government’s four-decade pattern of expanding Mumbai’s urban territory. The government, however, hails the Third Mumbai project as the next frontier of urban expansion.
Opposing expectations
The villagers want to ensure that their agricultural land is not acquired for a fraction of its worth. The government is offering the ready-reckoner rate, used to calculate property registration and stamp duty. The people of Raigad want the market rate, citing the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (RFCTLARR Act).
Atul Mhatre, an architect from Dadargaon (or Dadar) in the Pen taluka of Raigad, is one of hundreds who will be affected. He owns three acres of land. “As per the ready reckoner, I will get ₹1 lakh per gunta, which, as per market price, is ₹5 lakh per gunta.” In Maharashtra, 40 guntas make one acre.
Expected to drive rapid urban growth, the Third Mumbai Project aims to decongest nearly 45% of the State’s urban population concentrated in the 4,312-square-kilometre tract of Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR). It comprises Mumbai City district, the Mumbai Suburban district area of the Konkan Division, and parts of Thane and Raigad. According to MMRDA’s Final Regional Plan for the Mumbai Metropolitan Region 2016–36, urban areas accounted for 62% of Maharashtra’s population growth in 2025.
Estimated at ₹4,000 crore, the Third Mumbai project sits within a 20-kilometre radius of three major economic gateways. With direct road access to South Mumbai, it is about 10-15 kilometres from Atal Setu (Mumbai Trans Harbour Link), 15-20 kilometres from Navi Mumbai International Airport, and 12-18 kilometres from Jawaharlal Nehru Port.
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos this January, “Third Mumbai is an opportunity to create urban agglomeration; it has 60% data centre capacity. It will be a hub for new technology-enabling growth engines. With connectivity, it will bring Mumbai closer.” He said they plan to launch an Orange Gate tunnel, so people from Marine Drive, in the city centre, will be able to reach Navi Mumbai International Airport within 30 minutes. Once the Sewri–Worli Elevated Connector opens, those from the western suburbs can reach the airport in 30-45 minutes. “We are building connectivity. We can create a huge city, like Dubai, here. We have assessed the growth potential of MMR. It can alone become a 1.5 trillion economy.”
Priced possession
Nearly 60 metres from Chirner Lake, 28-year-old Amey Pitale walks briskly towards the Maha Ganpati Temple and sits on the steps. From his file, he pulls out a dog-eared notification issued by Maharashtra’s Urban Development department in 2019. It outlines the changed boundaries of MMR, extended to the 3 talukas of Raigad. Mr. Pitale’s father owns 2 acres of land, which is likely to be acquired under the project. “We are not against development if it is for us, the people of this land. MMR region, including Raigad, has a history of development at the cost of locals,” he says.
Villagers from Uran, Pen, and Panvel taluka gathered at Chirner village on June 7 to oppose KSC New Town (Third Mumbai project)
| Photo Credit:
Snehal Mutha
Three months before roping in Surbana Jurong to plan the Third Mumbai Project’s first phase, valued roughly at ₹11.89 crore, the Maharashtra government passed a resolution. It offered 3 provisions under which farmers could opt for compensation: land acquisition through mutual consent under Section 126(1)(a) of the Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning Act, 1966; compensation in lieu of cash in the form of Floor Space Index (FSI) or Transferable Development Rights (TDR); or allotment of 22.5% developed land as compensation for land acquisition.
MMRDA Commissioner Sanjay Mukherjee says, “The authority has given multiple choices for compensation, including the compensation under the 2013 Act.”
Another villager, Nilesh Patil, 40, joins Mr. Pitale at the temple. A chartered accountant, Mr. Patil has been keeping track of the infrastructure projects in Navi Mumbai. “Why does the government only believe in acquiring land? Why not bring on farmers as partners in the project?” he asks.
He also alleges that of the 22.5% of developed land, the farmers will receive only around 16% of the land parcel, as the rest is reserved for schools, hospitals, and community centres. “When and where [these buildings will be constructed] remains unanswered. Once the RFCTLARR Act is applied, farmers who are dissatisfied with the compensation or rehabilitation file a case in the court, which takes 10 years or so to be resolved. This has been their modus operandi,” Mr. Patil says.
Trust issues
The trust deficit pertaining to the Third Mumbai Project took root in April 2024, when MMRDA began consultations with Raigad residents. Farmers say they submitted 17,171 objections in an appeal. These pertained to land acquisition, compensation, and infrastructure development. However, according to a document from the Konkan Division’s Town Planning and Valuation Department, the MMRDA forwarded only 42 objections to the Urban Development Department (UDD) in September 2024.
On December 20, the MMRDA Virodhi Bhumiputra Sangarsh Samiti from Pen appealed to the UDD, alleging that most objections had been ignored.
Janga bai (65)s land was acquired under SEZ project. She came from Mothi Jui village to participate in the meeting on June 7.
| Photo Credit:
Snehal Mutha
During the Maharashtra Assembly’s winter session, the group burnt a copy of the appeal outside the Pen Provincial Administrator’s office. Social and political activist Nanda Mhatre cited the Maharashtra LARR (Amendment) Rules, 2023, questioning why no Social Impact Assessment (SIA) had been conducted to assess the impact on people, livelihoods, and communities.
In another letter dated April 22, 2026, responding to the March 16 Government Resolution on compensation, the farmers’ collective argued that the online consent form for land acquisition was vulnerable to fraudulent submissions and demanded that the process be halted until a transparent Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) was issued.
Responding to objections, MMRDA said the Mumbai Trans Harbour Link (Atal Setu) would spur regional development, justifying a new city in the public interest. On objections citing past experiences, it said these did not concern NTDA’s appointment.
Ms. Mhatre says, “We have objected to the entire project; NTDA is part of it. Did they take a hearing? No.”
MMRDA’s Mukherjee says, “The hearing is not required as written objections were taken and they have been responded to adequately.”
Past forward
The mention of urban development brings to the people’s mind the earliest memories of expansion and the angst of landowners who say they lost their farms to successive urban development projects.
The Navi Mumbai–Raigad region’s transformation began in 1970 when the City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO) of Maharashtra was set up to decongest Mumbai. In the 70s, it acquired land from 95 villages, triggering protests led by farmer leader Dinkar Balu Patil. Acquisitions continued through the 1980s, including for Uran’s Dronagiri node, while Jawaharlal Nehru Port Authority was commissioned in 1989.
In the early 2000s, the Navi Mumbai Special Economic Zone proposed acquiring land across 45 villages, but the idea was scrapped after a five-year agitation led by Ulka Mahajan and a referendum in 22 villages, where all 6,151 voters opposed it. In 2011, CIDCO acquired 1,160 hectares across 10 villages for the Navi Mumbai International Airport.
Once a farmer cultivating lentils, vegetables, and paddy on his half-acre farm, 54-year-old Jitendra Patil of Bokadvira village now works as a security guard earning ₹21,000 a month. He is forced to take on odd jobs. His land was acquired under CIDCO’s 1986 Navi Mumbai project for the Dronagiri node in Uran taluka. “I received ₹35,000 for 20 guntas. The District Court (Raigad-Alibag) later ordered CIDCO to pay about ₹55.9 lakh, but it is yet to do so. My family has grown, yet I cannot even build a room. Had I kept my farm, I could have survived and saved for the future,” he says.
Narrating a similar ordeal, 60-year-old Pramod Thakur recalls a 42-year legal battle initiated by his father. CIDCO acquired his 1.3-acre land in Uran in 1984 at ₹8 per square metre (about ₹43,000). Last year, the court ordered CIDCO to pay ₹850 per square metre (around ₹80 lakh). “I spent 40 years of my life to get my money; CIDCO is yet to pay the amount,” he says.
Janga bai (65)s land was acquired under SEZ project. She came from Mothi Jui village to participate in the meeting on June 7.
| Photo Credit:
Snehal Mutha
It’s been 20 years since Janga Bai, a 65-year-old woman from Mothi Jui village has been waiting for her land acquired under NMSEZ to be returned. At the gathering, she talks about the 12 guntas she gave for ₹5 lakh. “I was desperate for money because my husband needed medical care,” she says, which forced her to sell quickly.
Meanwhile, MMRDA has opened its portal for landowners to submit consent forms and supporting documents for acquisition by the NTDA. But Rupesh and the members of the MMRDA KSC Navnagar Virodhi Samiti say they have no intention of giving in.
“Raigad and Chirner have a legacy of satyagraha,” Rupesh says. It is a legacy the village wears with pride. On September 25, 1930, Chirner became the site of the Jungle Satyagraha, when hundreds of villagers defied British forest laws by entering the forests to collect firewood. The colonial police opened fire, killing 8 satyagrahis. The legal battle that followed was fought by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar.
Nearly a century later, the fight for many in Chirner is once again about land, rights, and dignity. “We will keep fighting,” Rupesh adds.
