Team Herald
VASCO: The beaches in Mormugao taluka are still lacking basic amenities like changing rooms, bio-toilets and drinking water.
A visit to beaches in Mormugao revealed that almost all the beaches lack basic amenities. Incidentally, all the beaches in Mormugao have a huge footfall of overseas and domestic tourists.
Locals say they have not seen any improvements on the beaches for decades.
Mashick, a local from Velsao said that there are basic facilities for tourists at the village beach. “Visitors tend to drink and break liquor bottles on the beaches, litter garbage giving it an ugly sight,” he said.
Velsao Sarpanch Henrique D’Mello said that there was a public tap at Velsao beach, but tourists started misusing it and now it is damaged. Even the high-mast light erected at the entrance of the beach is out of order.
“Forget about providing amenities for the tourists on the beach, the authorities are not even bothered to arrest the sand erosion taking place on the beach,” he said.
Olencio Simoes, an environmentalist from Cansaulim, said that declaring Goa as open defecation free (ODF) is a big lie. “Despite Goa being an international tourist destination, beaches at Velsao, Arossim, Cansaulim have no toilets or changing rooms,” he said.
“Besides, Goa’s biggest slum Sancoale, consisting of 15,000 residents, has no access to toilets till date. They residents of the slum are often seen defecating either early in the morning or late at night on airport road which is passing at Zuarinagar,” Simoes said.
Cansaulim Sarpanch Marta Saldhana said, “Facilities such as bio-toilets and drinking water need to be brought only after thorough study. There needs to be a mechanism in place to look after the maintenance of these facilities. Till now Cansaulim beach doesn’t have any of such facilities.”
Another Bogmalo-Chicolna panch Laxman Kavlekar said that to attract more tourists, the beaches should have changing rooms, bio-toilets, proper illumination, garbage bins.
