mumbai tata groups realty arm tata housing development company has joined hands with the mumbai metropolitan region development authority mmrda to invest rs 2000crore for a rental housing project near the metropoliswe plan to launch a large rental housing project near mumbai before diwali we have got approvals for the project from the mmrda tata housing development company managing director and chief executive brotin banerjee told ptihowever banerjee declined to reveal the timeline and exact investment in the projectaccording to sources that the investment would be around rs 2000crorethe project will come up on a 25acre land between thane and bhiwandi in the neighbourhood of the city and is expected to be ready in three to four years sources saidthe project is expected to come up on a land parcel owned by tata housing and will include a rental component of over 3 million sqft it is learntaccording to a human development report by the brihanmumbai municipal corporation and the united nations development programme published in september 2009 as many as over 50 percent people in the island city live in the slums primarily because of the exorbitant prices of the property in the land starved citythese people live in three distinct habitat categories the chawls which are either single or multistoreyed hutments singleroom tenements and pavement dwellers against the percentage of slum dwellers in the other major metros are much lower in delhi it is only 189 percent kolkata 1172 percent and chennai 2560 percent according to the same report the global average is onethird it notedmaharashtra had launched the rental housing scheme three years ago to provide low cost housing in the city that is starved of proper affordable housingthe mmrda is expected to get around 4000 rental housing units of 160 sqft each from the tatas while the rest can be sold at the market price