The nine-member Aquem Baixo panchayat appears to have only succeeded in changing its sarpanch and deputy sarpanch since the elections held in 2012 while not taking any concrete steps to address the various issues plaguing it.
The nine members elected to the panchayat are Sharon Quadros, Agnelo Dias, Deepa Naik, Damodar Naik, Amit Khanolkar, Diago Moraes, Amira Rebello Moraes, Floriano Fernandes and Pooja Naik. This panchayat has the unique distinction of having husband and wife elected as panchas in the form of Deepa and Damodar Naik.
Initially Deepa Naik was elected the sarpanch with Steven Vaz as the deputy, however they both were dethroned about a year later and Sharon Quadros wife of the famous snake catcher Julio Quadros was elected the sarpanch with Agnelo Dias as the deputy sarpanch.
The panchayat conducts regular gram sabhas however, the quorum is never formed and average attendance is around 100 persons.
While no project has been undertaken under MPLAD scheme in this panchayat, a shade has been constructed to a temple under the Zilla Panchayat funds.
The panchayat has not received any funds under NREGA and hence has not been able to undertake any works under this scheme primarily because the Gram Rozgar Sahayak was removed in 2014 and not been replaced as yet and the Project Director is apparently unresponsive to all requests by the panchayat.
The panchayat has constituted the three standing committees along with the supervisory committee. Besides there are other committees constituted like Village Development, Traffic Management, Garbage Management and Child committees. However, these committees have never met and hence do not function.
The panchayat collects only dry garbage from every house hold on a daily basis and has employed four labourers for the purpose. The collected garbage is disposed off through the Solid Waste Management Cell of Goa State Pollution Control Board.
Although there are a lot of migrants staying in rental premises in the panchayat, the panchayat does not collect any revenue from them as one of the oldest serving member Damodar who has been a pancha for around 25 years suggested that the next panchayat body decide upon this matter.
The financial position of the panchayat is not very gratifying as it collects only around Rs 5 lakh by way of taxes and relies upon government grants to the tune of Rs. 14 lakhs while it collected around Rs 7.03 lakh by way of house tax in 2015-2016 the balance to be recovered was Rs 17.29 lakh.
Besides, the panchayat has rented out 10 premises, but its rent collection leaves much to be desired as the rent collected is Rs 2.30 lakh as against the Rs 1.72 lakh balance that is yet to be recovered. Interestingly, the panchayat has not renewed the lease agreement since 1999 nor penalized the lessors for late payment of rent.
