Team Herald
PANJIM: The Aam Aadmi Party has launched a legal cell to aid Goans with the Coastal Zone Management Plan (CZMP) hearings.
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The party firmly believes that the hearings need to be held at the village level and should not be conducted in a haphazard manner in which they are now scheduled on July 8. The party, however, does not want to give BJP a chance to steal the Goans’ lands. The legal cell will be led by AAP leader Adv Prasad Shahpurkar to help the villagers in their CZMP objections.
It is pertinent to note that in the last hearings many Goans were excluded, and the demand across the State was that these hearings should be held at a village level to ensure each and every Goan’s grievances are heard. However, not only the hearings now happening on an open ground but are happening in the middle of the monsoon season.
“As regard to the draft, the State government and National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management (NCSCM) were required by CRZ Notification 2011 (Section 5, (II) to prepare the draft CZMP ‘in consultation with the concerned stakeholders’,” claimed the AAP.
“Goan fishermen will face the brunt as the CZMP prepared by the NCSCM fails to show the fishing activities of the fisher folks of Goa. The NCSCM draft CZMP does not even have a legend for fishing areas or fishing zones. This is in gross violation of the guidelines for preparation of CZMP and of the objectives of the CRZ Notification 2011,” the AAP mentioned.
“None of the teams have visited our village in Benaulim,” said AAP leader Captain Venzy Viegas.
“In its reply to the GCZMA, NCSCM has lied blatantly in the letter No 17-741 dated May 2, 2017 that it has carried out ground truthing,” added Capt Viegas.
