TEAM HERALD
teamheald@herald-goa.com
PANJIM: The Congress Party has voiced its strong opposition to ruling coalition’s apparent move to introduce an amendment to Goa Gambling Act during the five-day budget session of the Goa Legislative Assembly beginning Monday, for transfer of offshore casino licences.
Goa Pradesh Congress Committee President John Fernandes said the party will oppose it in the Assembly and thereafter even if the government later brings in an ordinance.
“I have got credible information that such legislation will be introduced in the Assembly session. I caution the CM (Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar)…and people should be aware there is a conspiracy to bring back new offshore casinos,” he told a press conference at Congress House on Friday.
He demanded to shift offshore casinos from Mandovi River while also questioning Parrikar’s double standard on the much-debated issue. “He (Parrikar) had hit the streets with women and activists voicing his stand against the offshore casinos as the leader of opposition but his stance has changed soon after coming to power,” he mentioned.
The move, he alleged was aimed at allowing a new 150-room vessel Qing belonging to Sahara Group, presently docked here, to replace one of the existing offshore casinos and also to allow another offshore casino belonging to a local group.
He pointed out Parrikar’s participation at BJP’s Chintan Baithak in Lucknow, where Sahara group’s headquarters is also incidentally located. “You can draw the inferences,” why Parrikar went to Lucknow.
To a question, Fernandes conceded that casinos were promoted by Congress while quickly adding it was meant for five-star hotels for the promotion of tourism only.
“The casinos were promoted by us because we thought the revenue of the country is drained in Nepal. Therefore, we wanted it be retain it within the country and we had moved casinos at five star hotels,” Fernandes who was on the tourism consultative committee for eight years said.
He described the entire process as an exception to stop tourism revenue from going out of the country. “If somebody has amended the law to allow casinos in backwaters of Mandovi then it is a bad law. We have found out the amendment in this regard was passed by then Cabinet by only circulating it. The ‘offshore’ word is not even defined in this casino statute,” he said.
The GPCC Chief however refrained from naming his party that allowed offshore casino amendment during its tenure.
He said it would be violation of the Directive Principals of State Policy if it is not incorporated in the State laws. “Let us have controlled casinos in Goa and only in the five star hotels,” he commented.
