SUNDAY, MAY 19, 2024
Team Herald
MARGAO: After a long wait, the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) has finally reconstituted the all-important State Environment Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) and State Expert Appraisal Committee (SEAC) for Goa.
The formation of new governing bodies was required since the terms of the previous ones had expired in November 2023, five months ago.
As per the official announcement made in the gazette notification recently, Dr Purushottam Pednekar will lead the newly-formed SEIAA as the chair, and he will be supported by other new SEIAA members, namely, Dr Dipak CS Gaitonde and the Director of Environment and Climate Change.
Likewise, engineer Pascoal Barbosa Noronha will chair the SEAC, tasked with appraising projects.
Among the SEAC members are Dr Nitin S Sawant, an Assistant Professor of Zoology; Dr Subhash Bhosale; Prasad Rangnekar, Dr Jose Faleiro; Sanjay Jahagirdar, Sujeet Kumar Dongre; and Sanjay Amonkar. The senior environmental engineer of the Goa State Pollution Control Board (GSPCB) will serve as the Member Secretary (MS).
It may be recalled the delay in reconstituting environmental bodies faced criticism from stakeholders, as it caused a setback for numerous major projects across various sectors that required environmental clearances.
Environmental activists had also raised concerns about the delay, fearing rushed clearances, and had the new committees to prioritise transparency and strictly adhere to environmental norms during project evaluations.
With the formation of the new committees, the approval procedure is anticipated to gain traction and progress swiftly.
