Team Herald
MARGAO: Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar in the presence of TCP Minister Vijai Sardessai officially inaugurated the 16th police station in South Goa at Fatorda this morning in the presence of a huge crowd and police officials including Director General of Police Dr Muktesh Chander and DIG Vimal A Gupta.
The police station is housed on the ground floor of the erstwhile police staff quarters at Fatorda which has been refurbished by the Goa State Infrastructure Development Corporation at a cost of Rs 25 lakh. While the police station is in three quarters, the fourth is used as Fatorda CCTV Monitoring Centre which is yet to become operational.
Addressing the crowd, Manohar Parrikar said the new police station is aimed at bringing peace and tranquility to the area and added that it will help even Margao Town police station as crime detection will improve in the area.
Stressing the need to intensify patrolling and improve intelligence gathering, he praised police for cracking the Davorlim murder case so promptly but added that other aspects like how many guns the supplier has sold in Goa and from where the gun was procured, needs to be known.
Brandishing figures of increasing tourist arrivals in Goa, he admitted that the 26 existing police stations in the State were inadequate and disclosed that within three months another police station will be set up at Navelim.
Acknowledging the presence of social activist Aires Rodrigues in the crowd he said the present building will house the police station temporarily till a new building is constructed to house the police station permanently.
While welcoming the gathered crowd DGP Muktesh Chander said Margao was the biggest police station in Goa having the highest number of crimes reported and also having jurisdiction of the largest area and hence it was right that Fatorda had to be carved out of it.
In his address TCP Minister Vijai Sardessai said he had always reposed confidence in Goa Police who he said are very capable and the only people who will protect Goans and recalled how when there was a demand that investigations in the desecration of religious places be given to CBI, he had stood firm on letting only the Goa Police deal with the matter.
He said the Fatorda Police Station will have “zero tolerance” to drugs and goondagiri and cautioned police officials lax in these two matter from even coming to Fatorda Police station leave alone working there.
Minutes after it was officially inaugurated, social activist Aires Rodrigues lodged the first complaint at Fatorda Police station under the Indian Penal Code and Prevention of Corruption Act and that too against local MLA and TCP Minister Vijai Sardesai.
Sardesai tweeted saying, “Activist does publicity stunt, trivialises our achievement with bogus case”.
