Team Herald
VERNA: Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar’s visit to Verna Industrial Estate and his interaction with members of the Verna Industrial Association during their AGM brought in mixed reactions from those who operate their business from the estate.
“The Verna Industrial Estate during those days (1994) too didn’t have proper infrastructure and the woes still continue. There are issues of lack of water, lack of underground cabling of electricity wires, multiple police stations, etc,” said the newly elected president of Verna Industrial Association (VIA), Damodar Kochkar.
Former president of VIA and managing director of GMI Zarhak, Blaise Costabir was of the opinion that many of their genuine demands made before the government have not been met yet. “The police outpost was created in Verna Industrial Estate but the notification to that is still pending. If the government wishes, they can simply assign Verna Police Station to look into the matter related to Verna Industrial Estate. Today the irony is we have three police stations and in some cases the compound wall and the building inside the compound falls under different police stations,” he added.
Mr Costabir was also concerned about the big chunks of land allotted to defunct organisations. “People used to get the land allotted in the name of setting up industries but used sell it off at commercial rates,” he added.
Regarding shortage water, Mr Costabir said that, “the entire requirement of Verna Industrial Estate is about 10 mld (million litres per day) but the estate gets only one mld of water from the government. The rest is either through borewell or through tankers and this is affecting the water table of the area very adversely and the local area villagers are on war path with the industrial estate on a daily basis.”
General Secretary of VIA, Durgesh Angle was positive about the visit of the Chief Minister and his team to Verna Industrial Estate. “I am in fact very happy to learn that the Government is showing intention of putting all things in order. We were expecting that the issue of water to be solved in about one year but Ganesh Gaonkar the IDC Chairman and MLA from Sanvordem announced that it will be sorted out within six months.”
