Mumbai Fishers to Protest Proposed Manori Desalination Plant with Friday Rally
Around 1,500 fishermen from Madh, Manori, Uttan, and other coastal villages along Mumbai's western coastline are set to participate in a protest rally on Friday against the proposed seawater desalination plant at Manori. Demonstrators fear the project will severely disrupt marine ecology and destroy local livelihoods.
The rally is organised by the Gorai Machimar Sahakari Sanstha alongside the National Fishworkers' Forum and the Maharashtra Macchimar Kruti Samiti. The march is scheduled to commence at 9am from the Madh coastline and culminate at Uttan chowk. Oldin Vasaikar, chairman of the Gorai Machimar Sahakari Sanstha, said the protest will highlight community concerns over brine discharge, fish breeding disruption, and overall marine damage.
According to Vasaikar, the facility will release concentrated brine into the sea, adversely impacting plankton growth, fish breeding, and the broader marine food chain. He noted that water intake could also trap small fish, drawing parallels to problems reported by fishing villages near operational desalination facilities in Chennai.
The proposed project is designed as a 400 million litres per day (MLD) seawater reverse osmosis plant to augment Mumbai's municipal water supply during lean monsoon periods. The project is planned in two phases of 200 MLD each, costing ₹2,066 crore for the first phase and ₹1,371 crore for the second phase.
The Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) report, prepared by Israel-based IDE Technologies, covers four villages—Manori, Gorai, Uttan, and Madh—which had a combined population of 15,362 according to the 2010 state marine fisheries census. The report acknowledged that roughly 70% of the local population depends directly or indirectly on fishing and allied activities, including boat repairs, net weaving, and fish trading.
Field assessments in the EIA recorded about 400 fishing boats operating from Uttan, alongside approximately 200 motorised and 150 non-motorised boats in Manori. The study projected that the plant will discharge 300 MLD of brine reject during phase I and 600 MLD during phase II. The discharged brine is estimated to have a mean salinity of 56.8 practical salinity units (PSU), compared to ambient seawater salinity of 35.5 PSU at the intake point.
Although the EIA stated that brine discharges will meet Central Pollution Control Board and Maharashtra Pollution Control Board standards, local fishing communities remain unconvinced and maintain that the increased salinity will cause fish mortality and threaten their traditional trade.
