The
Goa Foundation today announced plans to challenge the legality of Section 39(A)
of the TCP Act before the Bombay High Court, now that the rules to permit land
use changes under the said section have been notified.
The
Foundation is expected to plead for a stay of the provision as well as
cancellation of any land use changes made by the TCP department and subsequent
notifications.
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The
Foundation informs the public that all such changes in the TCP Act made since
2018 have become infructuous on some ground or another and people have only
lost large sums of money in the process.
For
instance, more than 8,000 applications were made for zoning/land use changes
under the newly added section 16(B) of the Act. Not only did the High Court
restrain the government from notifying the changes as law, the government
eventually moved a bill in the Assembly to cancel section 16(B). However, money
received by the government for the 8,000 plus changes was never returned.
Similarly,
large numbers of people have paid significant sums of money to the same
bankrupt government to obtain changes to the zoning of their plots under
Section 17(2) of the same Act. This change was introduced by the present Town
and Country Planning Minister and is even more arbitrary than Section
16(B). However, section 17(2) has also been challenged in the High Court, and
applications for stay of the first constructions on these plots are pending
consideration of the Court.
All
zoning plans for Pernem taluka, also introduced into law by the present TCP
Minister, have since been withdrawn.
The
newly introduced section 39(A), which allows spot zoning changes, but subject
to public objections in the gazette over a 30 days period, is also expected to
face the same fate.
In
each such exercise, the only beneficiary is the government, which refuses to
refund the application money, once legal challenges to these arbitrary ventures
in destructive planning are successful.
The
Goa Foundation is committed to the planned development of Goa within the
framework of the Regional Plan 2021. Any development contrary to that is bound
to face challenges, either today or tomorrow.
