TEAM HERALD
MARGAO: South Goa District Magistrate on Wednesday issued directions to issue summons to Margao Municipal Chief Officer and South Goa Planning and Development Authority (SGPDA) member secretary for their continuous absence for hearings in criminal proceedings over the pathetic and unhygienic conditions in the SGPDA’s wholesale and retail fish market.
The District Magistrate also directed that summons be issued to the members of the three-member committee, comprising Iftiyas Sayed, Rajashree Nagarsekar and Gonzaco Rebello, constituted by the Magistrate’s court to appear before the court at the next date of hearing fixed on September 18.
In another development, complainant Savio J Dias has made a written submission before the District Magistrate to close down the wholesale fish market in view of SGPDA’s abject failure to spruce up the market.
When the proceedings initiated under section 133 of the Cr PC came up for hearing before the Magistrate on Wednesday, both the MMC Chief Officer, the SGPDA member secretary, besides the three committee members were conspicuous by their absence. A visibly perturbed Agrawal then ordered that summons be issued to all the three parties to attend the next date of hearing.
Meanwhile, complainant Dias submitted that neither the SGPDA nor the MMC had made any attempt to keep the wholesale fish market clean, saying the wholesale market is lying in a pathetic and endemic state, and poses a public nuisance and a health hazard to the locality.
He demanded stern action by the Magistrate, saying that residents of Madel had been knocking the doors of the various authorities and courts for justice in the last 13 years. “Waste water from the market should be treated in the effluent treatment plant and not released in the open paddy fields. The illegal release of waste waters causes nuisance to the local residents living around the market complexes. Proper parking facilities must be made available at the wholesale complex. The three member committee have failed to submit their inspection reports and suggestions within stipulated time and thus wholesale market should be stopped from carrying out all operations till sanitary conditions are obeyed,” he prayed, while seeking necessary orders and directives to the SGPDA and MMC to stop the wholesale fish market for their failure and negligence for its upkeep and maintenance.
