The term governance has political connotations and refers to directives of how the country and its people are to be governed according to the principles laid down in the Constitution of the country or according to a document having a special legal sanctity.
Most countries in the world today have a democratic way of governance. In India too we have a democratically elected government, where the centre of power lies with the people while electing their representatives. Good governance comes with wisdom of political maturity and is people oriented, people friendly and one which takes the people into confidence whilst taking major policy decisions. In turn the people feel proud of their political masters.
In 2008 a mega housing project was to come up in a quiet coastal village of Carmona. A mega housing project consists of over 100 flats. The people of the village felt there were inadequate infrastructure of roads, water, electricity and other public utility services for the people themselves and wondered how the tiny village of Carmona would fend to the influx of the occupants of the mega housing project. An elected government has to think of the welfare of its own citizens first, which the Government of Goa then had closed its eyes. The villagers of Carmona led by a panch Orlando D’Silva had to shake up the then Chief Minister of Goa and urged him to think of the priorities of the people of Carmona and barged into the Chief Minister’s residence in Margao on two occasions. The masterstroke of the villagers of Carmona paid off. The file of the project which was propped up with the help of politicians, was then reverted back by Town and Country Planning to the village panchayat of Carmona to be handed over to the Mumbai based builder.
Today we are facing a similar situation in Tiracol, where the Leading Hotels have taken over ten lakhs square metres ”a gigantic area”. In the deal some Congress politicians are allegedly involved. Congress political masters have always worked for themselves in Goa and across India. Now in the name of “tourism”, the present government of Laxmikant Parsekar has given a green signal and he is proud to say the project is coming up in his constituency and it will generate employment. Instead he should have stayed the project from taking off, because the land area amassed by Leading Hotels is too big. When the mega housing project in Carmona was shelved off due to opposition from the locals the then Congress Government should have made it mandatory for the successive governments to bring to the notice of the people of Goa, corporate projects are coming to Goa for which huge lands will be required by the corporate sector or decide taking the people of Goa into confidence how much of our land can be kept at disposal for each of such projects. Golf is not our sport and no Goan possibly will ever set foot in Tiracol. If we have such politicians who think only of themselves, they will sell Goa. Is this the government of the people or is this the government of the politicians making hay while the sun shines at the cost of the people of Goa?
