So the heat is getting to him.Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar chose a discussion on the role of the media and NGO’s in Environment Conservation to basically say that environmentalists were disrupters of development.
And without mentioning either projects, he referred to the Mopa airport project and the Tiracol Golf and Resort project, both in his political backyard of Pernem taluka and asked activists not to raise ‘unnecessary objections’.
Look at his words: “The government is fully conscious about conserving the environment. But that does not mean that we should start opposing each and every project without any study of it. Continuous opposition to developmental projects is a major hindrance in running the State.”
If this was a general statement, it would have been a good ground for a healthy and meaningful debate. But since it is no secret that the elephants in the room are two projects that are being challenged for the right reasons, by the right people with the right intentions, his stand is perile. But Parsekar is no child when he says that projects are being opposed by those who have no study of it. In fact he is under pressure because there indeed has been too much study of both projects- the Mopa airport project and the Tiracol Golf Course which has caused this reaction. In case you didn’t notice, his remarks coincided with the Goa bench of the Bombay High Court issuing notices to the his Government, in a PIL filed by the villagers of Tiracol and Goa Foundation against the manner in which tenanted lands meant for agriculture were sold for the Golf Course projected against the Goa Tenancy Act and the Goa Land Use Act.
The Mopa airport project has almost become a private or at the very least a private interest project for the Parsekar family with land prices in and around the airport area leapfrogging five times, while those who lands are being taken away, got one-fifth the same land prices as compensation. The Environment Impact Assessment for the Mopa project should have been done as soon as the land was identified, not after the Request for Qualification was announced. And the initial EIA report which is still subject to a public hearing, there were shocking gaps and discrepancies noticed by most environment experts.
The EIA does not include a detailed environmental mitigation plan, a water availability and use plan and is based on falsehood about the vegetation, foliage and forest cover around Mopa.
Can anyone in his senses, least of all a Chief Minister of the state say that opposition to the Mopa airport and the Golf Course project (which is a private project by the way), are being orchestrated by those who have not studied them. When challenges are made against blatant anti-people illegality by the government or its agents, it needs, time, effort, research and money amidst constant opposition from departments like the TCP, the Collector’s office, the department of Enviornment and Science and Technology and even bodies like the Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority, which hasn’t covered itself with glory. The only thing that can keep them afloat in this unequal fight is “study” and information. So Chief Minister Parsekar shouldn’t even go there.
When the National Green Tribunal and the Court’s come down heavily on the government for the manner in which these two projects have been handled, the Chief Minister will have to answer the people of Goa and not his other non-official benefactors.
It is perhaps the “study” done by his non-official benefactors, which has prompted him to say, “It could be any project – airport or hotel. If it is planned on a barren plateau, we should not oppose it. We should look at such projects with a sympathetic view as they contribute to employment and revenue generation.”
The Chief Minister needs to clarify what he attributes a “barren plateau” to. The Mopa airport EIA states that 385 species of plants, 88 species of birds, 33 butterfly species, 5 amphibian species,12 reptile species and 11 mammal species are documented in the area. How on earth is this a “barren plateau?” It is another matter that the Pernem taluka has been left out of the list of eco-sensitive zones by a ‘high level working group” of the government who clearly didn’t seem to be working for the people of Goa.
Meanwhile the Tiracol Golf Course project is not on barren plateau either. It is in a area which nestles in an estuary, hugging the ocean and has rich fertile agricultural land which has been taken away from the people through guile and coercion. So we are indeed curious to know which fictitious barren landscape the Chief Minister is talking about.
Neither Chief Minister Parsekar nor his predecessors have ever taken even one convincing stand towards protecting Goa’s environment and there is no reason to believe that they will do so now. But at the very least, the Chief Minister shouldn’t use half truths bordering on untruths to ridicule people centric opposition, when they see that the government is clearly not on their side.
