Patkar ends hunger-strike after demands met
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Social activist Medha Patkar on Saturday ended her nine-day hunger strike to protest eviction of slum-dwellers from Mumbai's Khar suburb after the state government agreed to her demands, Patkar's associate said on Saturday.
"Medhaji has ended her fast after collector Nirmal Deshmukh came up with a notification where the government agreed to her demands," said Madhuresh Kumar, a member of National Alliance of Peoples' Movement (NAPM). Patkar, who began an indefinite hunger strike May 20, was taken to hospital after she complained of weakness and low blood pressure. Golibar in Khar is one of the 46 housing societies which is slated to be demolished under the slum redevelopment scheme, where 5,360 of a total of 7,350 families have been considered eligible for rehabilitation by the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA).
Apart from stop to the demolition at the slum, Patkar demanded the scrapping of a clause of the Maharashtra Slum Areas Act, 1971, allowing the state government to take over land without consent of the slum dwellers. She also called for an investigation into all other slum rehabilitation schemes in the city. "The government has agreed to stay the demolition of the slum and setting up a committee to enquire into 15 other cases of the slum rehabilitation schemes with the irregularities," Kumar said.
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