The decision to form a committee to suggest and then monitor beach safety is a step in the right direction. But it is just one of the many steps in the journey to cleanse Goa tourism, not just off glass bottles but filth and grime in all aspects.
Beach safety has to go beyond the physical and extend to a complete clean up, which includes drug free beaches. Therefore the campaign to make our beaches free of glass bottles and by extension garbage free, should include the war on drugs and ensure that the beaches are cleansed, in all aspects of the term.
The reason why both the campaigns – clean and safe beaches and drug free beaches should happen simultaneously is because of a very key point of contact – the beach shack. It is the beach shack which continues to be the interface between tourists and tourism. It is the critical Goa link. Therefore the bottles that you see strewn on the beaches are the ones bought at the shacks.The shacks are also the base for tourists who spend the entire day drinking and it is from there they venture out to sea.
The contours of the plan have been laid by the Chief Minister himself with stress laid on the role of the shacks in informing, educating and preventing. This will need a great deal of sensitisation. Like with the rest of Goa, the profile of shack owners is also changing. Many of them are owned and run by non-Goans whereas the staff almost entirely consists of boys from Bengal, Jharkhand and Orissa. Their affinity with the land is minimal and they can’t perform the role of the first ambassadors or the first points of contact and prevent tourists from messing up the beach.
This committee needs to bring out of the box thinking to the table. And this is where youth in Goa’s colleges should be drawn in. There is no better substitute than to ask college students to intern with the tourism department and act as beach ambassadors who will mingle with tourists, speak to them, send out messages and ensure that there is a strong but not obtrusive communication with tourists. The focus should be on tourist sensitisation, and not tourist policing.
The battle against drugs should also focus on shacks but the strategy has to be different. One of the worst kept secrets on Goa’s beaches is that drugs are indeed available in some shacks and small restaurants. In addition there are others which allow guests to smoke up without a fuss.
And the arrest of a staff member of Curlies shack with drugs recently drives home the point that the nexus between staff in shacks and drug peddlers is very strong. It is here that the very casual holiday drug consumer gets his fix. It is here that the entire DNA of policing in this belt needs to change. A special squad needs to be created and trained in each of the two districts which in turn will work round the clock only busting drug gangs and banning drug peddlers.
The committee constituted to give recommendations on beach safety must fathom the significance of their mandate. It is upto them to expand the ambit of “beach safety’ to take into account other factors which make our beaches unsafe namely drugs. At the same time the recommendations should not be limited to physical space of the beaches i.e. the sand area. The safety of parking lots in beach areas, the narrow dark rods leading upto the beaches and also the main streets of the tourist belt, should be in the ambit of recommendations of the committee.
Most importantly, this opportunity shouldn’t be wasted. There is a scope to create a road map to streamline the fundamentals of tourism and this should be done with seriousness that this demands and deserves.
