NoMoZo - For a
breath of fresh air
The 6th edition of NoMoZo at Porvorim will reportedly be inaugurated on February 9, by Bollywood star John Abraham. NoMoZo.
‘No Motor Zone’ is a festival that brings together fitness, culture, innovation, heritage and local arts. The idea behind NoMoZo is to reduce motor-vehicle pollution in a place by closing the road to allow children, adults and senior citizens to have activities there.
This event is also an opportunity for the community to come together. It is time to make the streets user-friendly and inclusive. Children will be able to spend their day fruitfully by learning something new and socialising with other kids. Senior citizens, who always shun traffic and sometimes fear crossing heavily motorised roads, will get a chance to relax in a non-polluted environment. However, the larger aim should be to send the message that we need to engage in non-motorised forms of transport.
People should increasingly use bicycles for travel as this will restore and maintain the physical and mental wellbeing of the population. Reducing our dependence on cars is also good for the planet as it will reduce pollution and Greenhouse effect. The process may not be simple, but this is a practical and easy strategy that can help people see streets differently by temporarily taking cars off the street. It would be in the fitness of things to hold such events in other towns across the State as well.
Adelmo Fernandes, Vasco
Goans need to fight
for their rights
The video of a Goan car driver travelling from Porvorim to Saligao being brutally assaulted by two rent-a-bike tourists in the middle of the road at Sangolda with helmets and fists after his four wheeler slightly collided with a scooter of a tourist went viral on social media.
Shockingly, most Goans, travelling along the same road during the incident, remained mute spectators and did nothing to save their fellow Goan. Now, wasn’t this shameful?
The Saligao Police have arrested the two tourists from Maharashtra and an FIR has been registered against both the accused.
Well, the reason why the domestic tourists of late are attacking Goans across the State is because they have studied all our weaknesses.
They know that most Goans are culturally/habitually susegad, have no unity and are just not bothered about what's happening around them.
Hey, when will our Goans really learn to assert themselves and fight to defend for their own rights/dignity or for their self-respect in Goa?
I think that as long as we Goans do not change our mindset/discard our old habits and continue living with the same old most indifferent ‘mhaka kiteak podlam’ attitude, we will continue to witness many more such unfortunate incidents in Goa in future. God save Goans and Goa...
Jerry Fernandes, Saligao
Iron will needed
to save Goa
For the first time since Liberation, the State government has approved the Goa State Amritkal Agriculture Policy 2025 which bans conversions of all fields designated as rice, morad, kher and khazan and focuses on revolutionising farming through hydroponics, aquaponics, urban agriculture and vertical farming.
Sustainable practices shall take centrestage and special emphasis shall be laid on cash crops like cashew, mango, arecanut, rambutan and grapefruit.
Those releasing sewage and waste water into agricultural land will be penalised
by GSPCB. Farmers owning over 4,000 sq mts of land shall be eligible for special
incentives and subsidies for promotion of agro-tourism on
their land.
All this sounds very good on paper, but with lakhs of acres of farmland being
converted with impunity to buildable settlement zones by the TCP
Department under the
guise of correcting errors in the masterplan the ban seems very difficult to implement on
the ground.
Real estate sharks from Delhi and Mumbai are given a free hand to run riot in our State with super-mega projects on fertile land in the villages; the destruction of our beautiful Goa is facilitated by the ones in power. Builders will find new ways to circumvent this ban by greasing the palms of mantris and sarkari babus. Lofty intentions and cosmetic bans are not going to save our State, an iron will is required.
Vinay Dwivedi, Benaulim
A step to destroy Goa
The bill to amend the Code of Comunidades is a step to destroy Goa the State government whose only love is for vitamin M. There are protests all over Goa against massive real estate projects and the Supreme Court has told the Goa Government not to turn Goa into a concrete jungle. Is anyone listening?
Matias Lobo, Tivim