The Goa government continues to pick the wrong battles, in its supposed effort to protect and boost tourism. At present it is doing neither. Its continuous run-ins with owners of shacks towards the way past the mid-point of this disastrous tourists season, is the biggest advertisement for a tourism policy and a plan which has gone all wrong.
Big ticket branding agencies, catchy lines, and supposed branding for Goa’s tourism stalls in travel marts are of no consequence unless the government of Goa, stops being antagonistic towards its biggest brand ambassadors.
While we have dealt with the issue of National Green Tribunal (NGT) making it mandatory to obtain permission from Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority (GCZMA) for running business on the beaches, the more pressing issue at hand is of shacks maintaining chemical toilets, with built in sewage disposal systems. The other pressing and perennial issue is that of waste management. The equation so far has been unequal. The State looks at shacks as the “other” and expects the “other” to fend for itself as any private business should. The State does not make any difference between a shack owner who is almost always a local from the village and a factory owner from out of Goa. Without any prejudice to the latter, the big business gets treated with absolute kid gloves, with lack of compliance of many regulations overlooked, while soft targets like shack owners get hauled up.
It is time to move away from court orders. The executive has erred in not making the shack policy shack friendly. Those who run tourism, in their wisdom, have felt that the best way to regulate and have sustainable tourism is to make the running of shack businesses extremely stringent. The policy puts the onus of installing CCTV cameras, chemical toilets and sewage disposal facilities on the shack owners irrespective of their size of business and the number of years they have been running. This would have still worked of the State provided a minimum opportunity of a clear six months to do business per season from October to April. Due to the delay in issuing licences each year and with other green tribunal directives coming in the way of operations, the shack business is reduced to a mere three months. And with a fall in tourists, even the quantum of business has dropped hugely. According to informed estimates the fall in revenue over a six month period for shack owners is over 75% across a three year mapping period.
Therefore, the following questions need a public reply:
a) How is it possible for shack owners to make additional spends on toilets, CCTVs and waste disposal mechanisms when they are earning 75% less than before.
b) How does the government justify increased tourism footfalls? We need a detailed month-wise break-up of how these tourist arrivals have been calculated, the profile and the average number of days spent per tourist and the spend per day including on hotel rooms. It is only then that tourism numbers will have value. We now have numbers without value.
c) Do these numbers include pilgrims who arrived for the exposition of the sacred relics of Francis St Xavier, which could have swelled statistics without any tangible effect on Goa’s tourism revenue.
If Goa wants to cradle its tourism goose, it cannot trouble it. News reports such as these are disturbing
“Agitated over the shack policy unveiled by the government on Wednesday, shack owners will hold a black-flag demonstration outside tourism department in Panaji on the occasion of World Tourism Day demanding a roll-back of the policy”.
Or these comments:
“This is not what we expected from the Manohar Parrikar government. Not only have the fees been hiked but the policy will hit every Goan who is in this business. We had worked to bring BJP to power but now it looks we have been taken for a ride”, Shack Owners Welfare Society President Cruz Cardozo said.
The bottom line is that you cannot expect happy tourists if you have angry and deeply upset tourism stakeholders.
