GOANSPIRIT
it never dies

The Modi magic has not really worked in Goa, unless one factors in that the party has been in power continuously since 2017 but even that by breaking the Congress and cobbling together a majority through smaller parties and independents.

The more things change, the more they remain. And so it is with GIDC and the lie that Goans are preferred for employment in industrial estates. GIDC continues to be corrupt and non-Goans get all lucrative jobs. You'd think MNCs/big players make huge investments but Goan contractors are lucky if they get some tertiary contracts in what are basically assembly line units. Also,It is amazing how Goa’s various rungs of the Mafiosi work in the twilight zone and the power they wield.

Goa is so insignificant although many tourists descend here for the sun, sand and fun that no national news even mentions how it is being affected by Covid -19. And CM Sawant is floundering whereas he was sure of himself about Parrikar's memorial on Miramar beach and allocated Rs 10 crores. Parrikar himself went by the committee that studied construction on Miramar beach and backed off. Sawant is deaf to protests from environmentalists and people who demanded a cancer hospital instead.

Congress accuses Mauvin of interfering in the MPDA meeting last November to reject the Colour Code Plan by the Navy to protect the funnel zone of aircraft from high-rises. In fact, the court says the MPDA and Panchayat affidavits create the impression that they are interested in protecting structures regardless of aviation safety. The Court has directed the navy to file compliance report on action against constructions in survey No. 60/2 of Chicalim, before 7th September, 2020.

The BJP government suddenly delisted the Talpona river in Canacona from a list of 11 polluted or partially (stretches) polluted rivers in the third week of January? It claims that ‘interventions’ by the Department of Panchayats (DOP) through ‘solid waste management’ did the trick or, should I be saying conjured up the magic. It's more likely as a result of NGT's March 31 deadline because this government has shown blatant disregard for the environment.

Please save me your angst, I am not calling for suicides of those affected by no mining and the dip in tourism, just stating the difference between crocodile tears and reality. In plain English, tourism does not help all Goans as the media’s stories tell you and Michael Lobo’s almost daily rant makes it out to be. What I am saying is both the tourism and mining industries in Goa got greedy and dived headlong into the mess both created. Greed for money has taken over.

In the second and final instalment about the web of lies in the EIA of the Nauxim Marina, GS questions whether MPT has a commitment to Goa. AHOY will do what it wants, because Goa is open season for any outsider with big bucks. Kargwal is just a realtor that will plunder Nauxim and take away the fishermen's essence.And Goa, already weighed down by over construction has a callous government which has ignored entreaties to dredge the Sal river but is gung ho about AHOY's plans.

Till date it has not revealed details of the tender. Such disclosures could prove that it was not fair, a charge the MPT must take blame for. In one tone AHOY talks about yachting, in another, about boats and in a disturbing voice about stays for both foreign and domestic tourists. Is it really a marina for yachts and as the firm’s name also implies or, is this just a cover-up for now; pending the real intended plan to be unveiled of a project for pleasure cruises for domestic tourists?

The fact that the prostitution racket has burgeoned in Goa is indicated by people’s anger and villagers becoming vigilantes because authorities refuse to act as they are paid off. Goa is not only a destination state, almost 12 per cent of Goan woman too have been victims of CSA. And it has also spread to the interiors. Goa's image projected by the government and tourism industry as a place where booze, drugs and girls are available, has led to the proliferation of CSA here.

“Some burn us, some pull our hair. They feel since they have paid, they can do any thing," is a poignant account. Trafficking to Goa, saw a reduction in the last 5 years from the NE but Maharashtra, WB and Delhi were the top two source states. Among the 353 rescued, 298 were Indian and 55 foreign. Earlier, limited to hotels/massage parlors, now prostitution is practiced in residential areas, Being tech-savvy in CSA has become a curse.

An aggressively enterprising politician he has been on the fast lane always. He bought 14 properties in God's Own Country apart from all that he acquired in Goa during his term as chairman of GIDC. His list of houses, property and offices is astonishing for a class 8 pass-out. Now a Delhi resident has gone public with bribe accusations against Kavlekar in his new avatar as TCP minister for converting his property which had all the 'criteria of being classified as settlement zone'.

Sawant wants to allow four liquor bottles with permits for tourists, but it only helps them to haggle over the bribe amount. Babush told the revenue minister/ wife, Jennifer, “I doubt your labour officials have even entered the casinos.” When rebuffed by her, he retorted, “The casinos don't even allow the cops to enter.” “Voters will throw him into the sea not to survive, but to be devoured,” Congress' Trajano said Fisheries Minister whose ignorance was for all to see

The CM says 80% reservations for Goans in industries cannot stand the test of law. First pass the law and show us how Goemkarponn you are. Jennifer Monserrate says it's a major policy decision; how is helping ethnic Goans that? Have not BJP govts broken environment rules defying Central regulations, their own regulatory laws while licensing big building constructions ? Did Parrikar not mock the SC order banning bars on national highways, by converting certain sections into State ones?

GIDC's mega projects have changed Goa's topography for the worse and the so-called infrastructure projects have never tendered directly to companies. When you control the prescriptions for vitamin M, why care? GIDC has spent Rs 27.83 crores on the abandoned Ravindra Bhavan at Sancoale. CAG's report said GIDC’s failure to finish the Margao Hospital on time resulted in a Rs 68.76 cr loss. Incidentally, the High Court called the SEZ scam illegal in a “manner not known to law."

TTAG has agreed that the proposed board could be part financed by increasing fees for licensing of tourism activities, registration and renewal. The same TTAG has consistently opposed any hikes! Drugs, sex tourism and a certain class of tourists has combined to make Goa an undesirable destination. ARZ last week exposed www.hookupravels.com. whose crass language says it all. Its rather offensive characterization: Picking up girls in Goa is an easy job when compared to the rest of the country.

TTAG did not object to bus high-end tourists from the airport. Why would it when its members get tourists delivered almost free at their doorstep while you, pay almost the same amount to commute to work? Not a single country would encourage the cheap tourists to drink on their beaches. This is how Goa’s beaches have become toilets and bedrooms for drunken tourists. And yet, TTAG would be ecstatic if the tax on liquor was reduced or simply done away with for the sake of tourism.

TTAG's latest rant now is about the foreign junkets by the tourism department and minister. This is not the new normal. It is as old as when Goa’s tourism grew into an industry entirely motivated by personal gain while stumbling forward without a vision. In fact the stakeholders have turned their backs on the degradation of beaches. Grandiose plans, all commercially unsound and risky, have been made at great expense by consultants from outside Goa and put on ice.

The almost weekly murders by migrants has carried on. As seen from this series, migrants of the Muslim community dominate organized gang crime. While, other migrants, appear to have reached new heights in their perfidious activities. But politicians nurturing votebanks and corrupt officers play a part. How else do you explain a deed of transfer of rights and interests without any compensation was executed by a person who was alive with one who died decades ago.

Goa’s slum population increased 81% over a decade. At 1.8%, its slum to total population is higher than 6 larger states. In 2017, a study of 14 slums showed that the largest number of migrants came from Karnataka, then UP, Jharkhand and Maharashtra. Residents of Goa’s slums have a decent living and also own cars, taxis, small/big trucks, etc. Maulana denies any political patronage, but how else can a migrant and novice in the business control the entire fish trade in south Goa?

Last year, of the 13 murders in south Goa alone, 11 were committed by migrants. One of the victims was Sucorrina Fernandes and the murder was investigated by the Curchorem police. In another case, a 21-year-old migrant killed 51-year-old Baptisto Roy D’Costa of Colva, in Betalbatim, and robbed him of his gold chain, gold bracelet, two rings and Rs 9,000 and USD 200 in cash.

Because of the wealthy non-Goan or ‘outsider’ no Goan village is as it was two decades ago. In bigger towns too like Vasco, Margao, Panjim, except (mercifully) in the odd old quarter of town where landholdings are just too tiny to interest greedy developers. Non-Goan builders even hire non-Goan architects which has a cascading effect. The old Goan way of life is fast deteriorating any way you look at it.

So while the state government is happy simply because the government exchequer is making money on mining for the first time in 18 months after losing revenue of Rs. 125 crore per month because of the ban , whereas others in the business do not really stand to gain because the e-auction is a one-off thing.

Claude Alvares said, "The auction of the illegal ore (four million metric tons by his estimate) would mean the state government will get a windfall of around Rs. 1,200 crore. The loan liability works out to Rs. 1,000 crore. The government should buy the mortgages of the trucks and barges at 50 per cent discount rate. This would give it Rs. 600 crore worth assets overnight."

While in the late 40's, when exports started, around 30-40 thousand tonnes of iron ore was exported through Mormugao Port. The last decade however showed an average export of 32 million tons of iron ore. The highest being 54.42 (Goan & Non-Goan origin) million tons exported in the year 2010. Before the ban in October 2012, the state mined about 11million tons. So, winners all around, except for Goa.

There are a total of 554 travel agencies operating in Goa according to the tourism department. Goanspirit thinks the time has come for the Goa government to investigate Belyakova herself because everything Russian which goes against Indian law appears to have the Belyakova stamp on it.

In 2010, the Bombay High Court had directed all village panchayats to create composting facilities for bio-degradable waste within their limits and make arrangements for weekly collection of non bio-degradable waste. The court also ordered all the municipal councils to acquire land for landfill sites to dump garbage. Clearly, there is a need to wake up to the reality of the garbage problem compounded many times over by the large number of tourists.

The Centre for Responsible Tourism (CRT)and SOWS say: It is our belief that the small, medium hotels and guesthouses put back 90 per cent of their revenues into the local economy; not the 5-star hotels whose contribution to the local economy is only ten per cent. And yet, the yardstick for everybody is that shacks, taxi drivers, the small, medium hotels and guesthouses are there to be trashed.

On June 3, 2013, Kerala High Court banned construction of the Aranmula airport for two weeks through an interim order on a petition by the Aranmula Heritage Village Action Council seeking the ban by reclaiming paddy land because this contravenes the Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land & Wetland Act.

Clearly, the Sriperimpudur project was in the air for years. Clearly too, the politician-bureaucrat nexus was holding sway. In the end it is not only infrastructure financiers and banks that are not for Greenfield airports, it is also that airlines hate to fly to airports that bleed them dry.

Congress drummed up this project called Ludhiana Aerotropolis prior to 2009. It looked more like it had drummed up an alibi to make money. The project envisaged acquiring 9,000 acres , 6,000 acres of it for the airport. Airports attract the urban middleclass who, because they are built in the interiors are never affected by land acquisitions. It's the farmers' land that is always at risk in the event.

The village feels betrayed by their own. "Ganguli got these tenants and cultivators to sign negative declarations before the magistrate, in other words, they declared in writing they were not tenants. But, they are undeniably tenants because they have already paid the tenancy land purchase price.I have obtained some of these receipts through RTI," Rodrigues says.

The refrain among green activists is, "she never answers our phone calls". That has reportedly angered Goa Foundation. Even, a popular local activist, also a diehard Mathany supporter and one who has given the most to the Saldanha family in all the elections they have contested, has said in some circles that his single biggest mistake in life was to support Alina. In fact, the joke in village Cansaulim is that the only presence of Alina being their MLA is the sight of her brand new white officia

"The victory of Goans in the 1967 Opinion Poll, whereby the proposal to merge Goa with Maharastra was rejected with Goans asserting their right to their own separate identity and the declaration of Statehood in 1987, is becoming meaningless in view of the fact that Goans are about to become a minority within the borders of Goa".

They are not willing to expose the BJP because skeletons will tumble out of their cupboards. Even the resounding defeat in the Assembly elections last year did not lead to analysis or introspection. They are not able to harvest anti-establishment feelings. The deficiency of the Congress is helping the BJP.

IRB website says: concession period-95 years, estimated project cost (incl. land cost) as per IRB-Rs 175 crore, land cost premium-Rs 7,96,000/hectare, airport area-670 acres, runway length -3,170m, upfront land premium to be paid to MIDC- Rs 20.70 crore, airport development period-18 months, operations & maintenance-93.5 years.