The Bandra-Worli sea link project was conceived in the 1990s. But, plagued by a series of public interest litigations from fishermen and environmentalists, the work on the project could not take off till October 2004.

One NGO even took it to the Supreme Court, which dismissed its plea.

Agitations, however, forced MSRDC to make drastic changes, to the tune of 80 per cent, in the design of the bridge.

This, in turn, escalated the cost of the project by around Rs 350 crore (Rs 3.5 billion) from the initial planned outlay of Rs 1,306 crore (Rs 13.06 billion) to Rs 1,650 crore (Rs 16.5 billion).