We, the concerned and affected villagers of Chorao, seek to bring to Chief Minister Dr Pramod Sawant’s attention and request your kind and urgent intervention through the relevant authorities on the major issues plaguing our island village greatly inconveniencing all of us as well as the mainlanders commuting through our island village. Following are the major issues:
1) Prevalent cattle (150 headcount) squatting on our village roads especially at the junctions due to irresponsibility of their owners and inaction of concerned authorities despite repeated complaints.
This has been posing a major risk to the pedestrians as well as two-wheeler riders’ safety with many collisions and skidding-on-dung accidents and injuries already having happened to many people, especially at night. Fortunately, no life has been lost yet and we hope it won’t need one for this issue to be completely addressed.
Our health-conscious villagers who used to do long walks and cycling in the village have stopped doing so due to cattle-blocked roads, fear of skidding on the dung and personal safety. Daily office goers are majorly inconvenienced especially during rush hours.
In medical emergencies, besides our life-threatening yet unavoidable ferry delays, this cattle menace is an additional hindrance, be it for the 108 Ambulance or private vehicles rushing to hospitals. The dung being wasted on our roads causing above issues, could actually be turned into a valuable organic fertilizer for agriculture and source of income for the owners.
2) Persistent flooding of the Pomburpa ferry road due to frequent bund breaches since four years resulting in accidents, corrosion-damage to vehicles and a major commuting inconvenience to all villagers.
This cuts off our main route to Bardez requiring us to travel extra 12 kms via the Calvim route. The surrounding khazan fields remain inundated and uncultivable. We need urgent and effective bund repairs and maintenance, road elevation increase at flooding points with suitable drainage channels underneath, and mangrove restoration on Mapusa River side.
3) Garbage dumping prevalent all over our village due to lack of organised Waste Management resulting in unhygienic conditions spreading diseases.
This is polluting our ground water especially with batteries and e-waste. Sanitary waste (viz pads, diapers) is strewn all over. Many mainlanders passing through our village are found to dump their daily garbage in our village. Poor awareness among our villagers and commercial establishments on waste segregation and disposal is contributing towards this issue. This is reflecting very poorly on our village’s implementation of our visionary Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Swachh Bharat Mission. A well-organised end-to-end waste management programme is a necessity for our village including bio-waste incinerator, e-waste disposal etc.
4) Absence of 24×7 medical services on our island when the nearest significant help is at least an hour away.
This is despite Chorao being the largest island of Goa with population of more than 6,500 and significantly higher elderly constituents since most young family members are outside Goa or India for livelihood. Many of our villagers’ lives have been lost in medical emergencies due to the delay caused by our unavoidable ferry crossings on way to any major hospitals. Given the high number of well-maintained yet vacant houses here the accommodation for a medical team here could be easily arranged. Or the abandoned infrastructure opposite Primary Health Centre could be revived.
5) Lack of sufficient mobile towers resulting in great difficulties for students, professionals and public in general
Despite our island being the largest in Goa we barely have a single mobile tower here making our island backward in this regard. The situation is a result of local political manipulations, public misinformation as well as violations by mobile companies in not setting up their towers at the three gram sabha approved sites in compliance with Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) safety regulations. The low mobile signals reaching us from mainland towers across the rivers pose a greater health hazard to our people from device radiation when it’s held to the ear as is a common practice. Some of our lives await to be lost in medical emergencies due to lack of sufficient mobile connectivity, a necessity and essential service in rest of the world. Our island needs at least two more mobile towers fully compliant with all relevant safety regulations.
We hope you agree that the above-mentioned issues are of grave importance and need immediate attention of the relevant authorities. We would be highly obliged if these issues are addressed on priority through your kind intervention and facilitation. We look forward to your patronage to make our beautiful island a model village in Goa and beyond.
