Sujay Gupta: We are here to debate on an issue that affects all of us. Both dealing with the development as well as the environment. The balance seems to be shifting to the side of development, which may be a good thing. But environment too has to be taken into consideration. There are a gamut of issues starting with the Environment Impact Assessment for the Mopa Greenfield Airport, and also whether agencies that are mandated to safeguard the environment are doing the job or not. But most importantly, we need to look at whether Goa has the environment of planning and talking the path of sustainable development.
Rahul Basu: There are some big issues in the Mopa EIA that glare at you. The biggest one is on the evaluation of alternatives. The EIA very clearly shows that there is not enough demand in some ways for Mopa. It shows that Dabolim has a capacity of 9 million. Also the capacity of both Mopa plus Dabolim will reach 9 million in 2030 year – which is 16 years away. More interestingly it also shows that Dabolim will not exceed the current utilization of 4 million even though it has a capacity of 9 million today, which begs the question why are we building such an airport when Dabolim is being so massively under utilised. This is a subject of discussion of the EIA. The analysis is supposed to be part of the EIA, but frankly there is just one line.
Another issue is from where the water for the project is coming. If you look at Pernem it is fed by rivers Chapora and Tiracol at this present moment or from the Tillari canal. But the canal is supposed to be for irrigation. If it starts getting diverted to Mopa it might be an issue as it is not only Mopa airport, but the town and maybe the golf course too. And here, we do not have any catchment area.
The EIA very casually says that there is no biodiversity on the Mopa plateau. However, there was another study on lateritic plateaus of the Western Ghats. These lateritic plateaus actually have higher biodiversity than the Western Ghats. The airport will automatically destroy the biodiversity as the concrete will be poured and the place will be ultimately leveled out. Also these plateaus have very high diversity in the monsoons so studying them from October to December is not going to show you anything. The study was done in 2011 in the previous government’s tenure. But it was done for a very short tenure.
Siddharth Karapurkar: I strongly feel that the EIA has to be done for the whole year and not for three month, if you want the check the flora and fauna. Also there are other small issues, like the EIA says that Mopa airport is 2 kms from the Maharashtra border. This is not so. But Mopa is on the Maharashtra border. The reason why Mopa was proposed to be built was that Dabolim was full. But the study was not done whether the present Dabolim airport could be upgraded.
Sujay: Even though the opposition is genuine, why is the government not mitigating the issues?
Harish Melwani: Let us look at it from a different perspective. Goa is a teenage state. And just like a teenager falling in love with someone or the other, only to realise later that this love is not justified. We have to be mature as at the moment we are behaving like love-struck teenagers. You look at either the Mopa issue or the Dabolim upgradation or even Tiracol Bridge, or the mining problem. Basically this is the government. And it can’t govern.
Goa government has to think what the people really want. What the definition of development is? It has to be gone into in detail, areas wise, because the concept of development in my home town is different from say Panjim. The government has to go into this, with a zero base. But this analysis is not happening. I don’t see that deep thinking happening.
It is just some project announced and then the people run after it. And then to their horror they realise that it is not for us and then it is discarded. See the IT Habitat. Such valuable real estate blocked and it is being used by migrants. Look at Nylon 6,6. Look at the mining situation. Goa is endowed with mineral wealth. But here the scientific method is thrown in the dustbin and the rape of the ground is done. We have made so many mistakes but we are not learning from them.
Pradip Sirmokadam: Pernem needs better employment facilities. The best part of this whole exercise is that it is a Greenfield airport. It is coming up from scratch. This should not be done in a hurry. If we are not part of the decision making effort then this is inclusive.
EIA is the basis of a decision making process. It is not that first the decision is taken and then the EIAs are done to justify the project. Also in Pernem there is animal – man conflict. Now animals do not have any habitat.
Sujay: Shouldn’t people be the basis of all development?
Rahul Basu : If you look at general development its can put it in broad brushes, the government looks at selling its resources. First is mining. The second is tourism and the third is the real estate. If we look at the three main industries, we are basically broadly selling our resources.
Harish Melwani: The investment promotion board is a good idea. This is how most modern States work. But then there has to be a master plan, to see what industries are going to be allowed to come in.
Rahul Basu: We need a proactive strategy. Alternate sustainable industries including entertainment and films have a huge scope in Goa and those need to be explored.
Pradip Sirmokadam: There is definitely a chance in Goa for other types of projects, but now what is spoken about is sustainable development.
