Adani Group beats L&T to win ₹36,000 crore redevelopment project in Mumbai

Adani Properties, the real estate arm of Gautam Adani-led Adani Group, has emerged the highest bidder to redevelop 143 acres in Mumbai's Motilal Nagar along with the state’s housing body, the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA), reported newswire PTI.

Motilal Nagar I, II & III is one of Mumbai's biggest housing redevelopment projects in the western suburb of Goregaon (West).

Adani Properties Pvt Ltd (APPL) emerged as the top bidder, offering more built-up area than its closest rival, L&T, the newswire reported.

APPL won the bid by agreeing to hand over 3.97 lakh square metres to MHADA while other qualified bidder, L&T quoted the figure of 2.6 lakh square metres, it said.

Last week, the Mumbai High Court approved MHADA's plan to redevelop Motilal Nagar with the help of a Construction and Development Agency (C&DA). The state government has labelled the project as 'special,' allowing MHADA to maintain control while partnering with a C&DA due to the lack of sufficient resources, economic feasibility, and the ability to complete the project independently.

This is the second big redevelopment project of the Adani group in Mumbai. The Gautam Adani-led conglomerate had earlier won the bid to redevelop Dharavi, one of Asia's largest slums in Mumbai. The Adani group is carrying out the Dharavi project through a special purpose vehicle (SPV) with 80% equity, the rest 20% coming from the Maharashtra government.

As part of the Dharavi project, Adani intends to transform 620 acres of valuable land—roughly three-quarters the size of New York's Central Park—into a vibrant urban centre. Around 1 million people currently reside in cramped, dilapidated shacks with open sewage and shared toilets in the overcrowded slums, located near Mumbai's international airport. As part of the $3 billion plan to transform the trash-filled Dharavi slum in Mumbai into a 'world-class' district, eligible residents will receive flats of up to 350 square feet at no cost.

The rehabilitation phase of the Motilal Nagar project is set to last seven years from the commencement date. According to the tender requirements for the Motilal Nagar redevelopment, the C&DA is obligated to provide 3.83 lakh square meters of housing space.

MHADA maintains complete control over the project, including ownership of the land. It issued a tender for the redevelopment because of its own financial and technical constraints in managing such an extensive redevelopment, reported PTI. The private developer cannot mortgage the land, raise finance on it, or sell/transfer rights without MHADA's permission, according to the tender conditions. This protects MHADA residents, slum dwellers and prevents misuse of redevelopment right, the report said.

The project will rehabilitate 3,372 residential units eligible under MHADA, 328 eligible commercial units and 1,600 eligible slum tenements as per the 1971 Slum Act, the newswire reported.