PANJIM: Goa Bachao Abhiyaan (GBA) on Sunday has opposed the proposed insertion of Section 16B in the Town and Country Planning (TCP) Act instead of incorporating the 73rd and 74th amendments to the constitution for people’s participation.
“TCP ministry in its new brazen attempt as a law unto itself recognises only land owners as stakeholders in planning the future of Goa and defies principles of equality, justice and public interest in allowing selective changing of land use for personal gains. This must not be passed in the Assembly of elected representatives who represent the whole of Goa and its multiple stakeholders,” GBA Convenor Sabina Martins said.
“Citing hapless citizens who are victims of cartographical errors, unsuspecting buyers of plots in No-Development Zones, the TCP ministry seeks to amendment the TCP Act with insertion of 16B, amongst other things like Transfer of Development Rights (TDR). In allowing selective advantage to a few for payment, it ignores the principles of natural justice for the rest of the stakeholders, which is the entire population of Goa who is not landowners, but deserve the right to environment and participative planning,” she said.
The GBA further said that the ministry has missed an opportunity yet again, to take the people of Goa into confidence and amend the TCP Act along the lines of the 73rd and 74th amendment to the Constitution, 1992, which recognises all people as stakeholders in participative planning.
“It is a matter of shame that despite more than 10,000 signatures asking for amendments to include peoples participation in planning as per the Constitution (73rd and 74th Amendment, 1992), successive governments have ignored the same. Protests since 2006 have been against arbitrary planning, which is exactly what Section 16B seeks to promote,” GBA said.
