By the time you read this, a mammoth exercise costing several lakhs of rupees, will be underway, to carry out a farcical Environment Impact Assessment of the Mopa airport. According to estimates an upwards of Rs 50 lakhs has been spent on making arrangements and moving men and water cannons to Pernem, to defend the state against suspected hordes coming on from South Goa to disrupt the process.
While the majority of South Goa’s MLAs have either lost steam or accepted honourary membership in the Pro-Mopa club, the Goa For Dabolim Only (GFDO) movement hasn’t been able to rise above a limited special interest group and whip up a mass movement. That has been GFDO’s failure and the people’s. Rather than find a meeting ground, the GFDO has edged clear of doing this with politicians who are a part of the anti-Mopa movement. Its failure is also that of the people of Goa because the sheer injustice to the people of Goa in pushing an International airport project when another one exists, has not been challenged, or challenged enough for the government to realise the force of its people.
The water cannons will not be needed, Mr Parsekar. Our new Chief Minister can sleep easy, because very soon, the Mopa airprort EIA will get a public stamp of approval and become a “people’s project”.
There will be no one to question a MOEF notification that EIA’s for Greenfield airports are done when the site is first identified, not after 84 lakh square meters of land has been acquired and a shortlist of bidders have requested for qualification criteria. What is going to happen on Sunday at Mopa is brazenly illegal. The BJP government will push through an EIA hearing which is fundamentally incorrect. It will be held in front of a non questioning audience and in the absence of any opposition, as the Congress too has ceded ground on this issue, as it has on most others like moving offshore casinos out of the Mandovi.
Meanwhile as this is getting played out EIA and Greenfield experts have cast doubts over whether the EIA has comprehensively mapped the ecological sensitivity of the airport site.
The biggest betrayal of the people of Mopa though is the compensation amounts paid for their lands acquired. The paltry Rs 800 per square meters is nowhere near the figure of five times the land value that the existing land acquisition act promises. Incidentally this amount has not been amended even in the Land Acquisition ordinance.
Therefore on all counts of transparency, fairness and honesty, the Mopa airport project falls short. The completely flawed EIA process is an addition to this long list.
It is also clear that the Defence Minister and the shining Knight of the pro-Mopa movement Manohar Parrikar, is making moves to counter the fact that two airports cannot exist within the proximity of Mopa and Dabolim. Therefore in order to defend the entire story of how Dabolim airport will be protected, Mr Parrikar has asked for the now closed Bangalore old airport to be reopened for flights. This is nothing but a track covering exercise because Dabolim will soon be out to slaughter at the altar of a one airport demand that Mopa investors will make.
While the government’s intentions are clear, not so are the plans and strategy of those who purport to fight against the Mopa airport. The Goa for Dabolim Only backers must fathom a basic reality. You cannot have Dabolim if Mopa is built, so stopping it by going there should be its only agenda. If it decides to fight this only through courts and not a people’s agitation, then we must conclude that this very well meaning movement hasn’t managed to inspire us or we have failed to stand up and be counted when it matters the most.
