There can be only one strong, unequivocal message to the project proponents of the two marinas which have been cleared by the Goa Investment Promotion Board. Do not use these in principle clearances to bulldoze the Pollution Control Board, the Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority and other bodies which will look into whether the projects are ecologically sound in all its aspects.
More importantly, environmental concerns have to be addressed and analysed not by bodies who have a vested commercial interest in the project, albeit as professionals, but a body of experts who lean heavily in favour of protecting Goa’s fragile ecology and bio-diversity and makes this a non-negotiable element in their decision making, an element which cannot be coloured by any other considerations, least of all clearing the projects in time because investments are blocked. At the end of the day a Rs 500 crore project- which the Yacht Haven project in Sancoale is- is being weighed against our land, our water, our eco system and our marine life. Do the people, bodies and investment promotion boards have a price for this? Is the worth of all these just Rs 500 crores? Will that sum cover all that we may lose if we do not take the right decision in favour of our land and nature?
The tragedy here is that any protest and any objection against a fat cat investment is seen as anti-development. The retort to this is simple. Does pro-development have to be pro-destruction? Does the target of creating 50,000 jobs have to be at the cost of felling fifty thousand trees, or by cutting hills or by destroying fish and marine life and oysters. The reason why these critical questions have to be asked is because too much has already been lost. Our lands, our forests, our hills and our villages have been ravaged. Do we now give our rivers up for destruction? Every project proponent will produce studies and reports to show that environmental concerns will be mitigated. During a discussion with Herald, before we did a special report in Herald Review (The yacht vs The oyster, Sunday May 3) on the marina project in Sancoale, the owner of the project and one of Goa’s most respected industrialists Umaji Chowgule said “The bio diversity board has expressed concerns and asked what if the window pane oysters in the Mormugao bay near the project epicenter are destroyed by our project. I ask what if they are not”. Herald’s respectable submission to him is that we can take a chance with the marina not coming up but we cannot take a chance with our fragile eco system. So if there is an element of doubt whether our window pane oysters will live or die, the project has to be on hold till we know that they will live. And this is not just about oysters, but about the entire ecosystem of which these oysters are just a part.
For the record, Herald is not against the marina project or against the belief that our rivers need to be developed to bring in more revenue and tourists to the state and jobs need to be created. But to achieve this, one must work overtime to ensure that the projects are weighed on the touchstone of environment and ecology by neutral stake holders.
There is every reason to believe that the Chowgules, who have contributed so much to Goa including creating some finest people resources through their education eco system, will be sensitive to the area they plan to develop. We are merely being watchdogs because we are hypersensitive to not letting economics triumph over ecology. And when the Bio Diversity Board and the Pollution Control Board have rejected the project, it is alarming that when the Chowgules went to the Investment Promotion Board, a one window vehicle to fast track project clearances, it did not hammer home the fact that their consent to establish had been rejected. The defense here will be that the rejections had preceded the birth of the IPB and in any case the project proponents had to go back to them after the IPB clearance. But this begs the question. If the project proponents went to the IPB with all details of the project including the fact that they had submitted their proposal to the GSPCB and the Bio Diversity Board, why were the results of those submissions not taken on record?
The equation is simple. However large or significant a project may be and irrespective of the amount it brings to the state, it ultimately is all about the bottom line of a private business which needs return on investment. The state of Goa, its natural resources and the common wealth of its people cannot be subservient to this private need.
