India, April 19 -- The civic authorities have set in motion the process to clear a century's solid waste from Mumbai's oldest, and largest, dumping yard - that's 20 million tonnes of garbage on 123 acres - so that it can house Dharavi's slum-dwellers who are ineligible for in-situ rehabilitation.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is finalising a tender to clear the solid waste at the Deonar dumping yard, and appoint an agency for biomining at the site. The project, which has a deadline of three years, will the cost tax payer Rs.2,000 crore.

The 326 acres on which the Deonar dumping ground stands is owned by the state government, which leased it to the BMC in the 1920s to dump the city's solid waste. As Mumbai's population gre...