The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation has withdrawn a Rs 2.9-crore tender tied to Mayor Ritu Tawde’s official residence in Byculla, four months after completing a separate Rs 2.4-crore renovation of the same heritage property, according to Free Press Journal. Tawde ordered the civic body’s garden department to cancel the tender after opposition parties accused the BMC of splurging on the bungalow while the city’s roads and drains struggled through monsoon.

What the tender covered

The scrapped works included bio-absorbent noise barrier panels along E.S. Patanwala Road, a container-based conference hall with interiors and furniture, interlocking paver relaying, new sewer and stormwater drainage lines, water tanks, renovation of staff quarters, and mechanical and electrical works, per Free Press Journal’s reporting. Tawde maintains the proposal covered the surrounding Veermata Jijabai Bhosale Botanical Garden and Zoo premises, not the residence itself, and called the backlash a “fake narrative” pushed by Shiv Sena (UBT).

Opposition leaders read the tender differently. Congress corporator Ashraf Azmi asked whether the money was going toward “public infrastructure or the comforts of those in power,” while Shiv Sena (UBT) MLA Aaditya Thackeray alleged the spending served the Mayor’s “whims.” Former Mayor Kishori Pednekar said withdrawing the tender had “only intensified the controversy and embarrassed the Mayor,” rather than settling it.

Part of a wider pattern

Congress MP Varsha Gaikwad tied the episode to an earlier row over proposed luxury cars for corporators, telling reporters that “after the controversy over the proposed purchase of luxury cars for corporators, the civic administration is now planning to spend another Rs 2.9 crore on luxury facilities,” according to a separate Free Press Journal report. Gaikwad contrasted the bungalow spending with Mumbai’s potholed roads, monsoon waterlogging, understaffed municipal hospitals, underfunded schools and strained BEST bus services.

Had the second tender gone through, the residence would have absorbed more than Rs 5.3 crore in civic spending inside four months, a pace of outlay that stood out against a city where several wards were still clearing waterlogged streets from the same week’s rain.

What it means for residents

The BMC is Maharashtra’s richest civic body and runs on a budget that funds everything from stormwater drains to public hospitals, all of it drawn from the same pool the Mayor’s residence upgrades would have tapped. Whether the works were meant for the bungalow or the adjoining zoo, as Tawde insists, the controversy lands at a moment when Mumbai residents are dealing with reservoir shortfalls, delayed metro lines and recurring flooding, making any discretionary civic spending on official residences a visible flashpoint regardless of its technical justification.

Outlook

The cancellation does not close the matter. Opposition corporators are likely to keep pressing for a public breakdown of what the earlier Rs 2.4-crore renovation covered and why a second tender followed so quickly, while the BMC’s civic elections later this cycle give the episode added political weight. Whether the garden-and-zoo works return in a revised, more transparent tender will be the next thing to watch.

Sources: Free Press Journal, Free Press Journal

This report was compiled and written with AI assistance from publicly reported sources, and reviewed for accuracy.