Goa govt blamed for blocking Port road

Goa govt blamed for blocking Port road
HERALD CORRESPONDENT
NEW DELHI, DEC 13
The road connectivity of almost every major port in the country is progressing smoothly except the 4-laning of the National Highway-17 road connecting the Mormugao Port in Goa, the Centre disclosed in the Lok Sabha on Monday.
In a written reply to Biju Janata Dal’s Arjun Charan Sethi, Shipping Minister G K Vasan said: “Unfortunately, this project is getting delayed due to the uncooperative attitude of the State government.”
He regretted that despite the Bombay High Court’s Goa bench giving clear directions to the State government to hand over the entire stretch up to Sada junction to NHAI (National Highway Authority of India), “the State government continues to allow the unauthorised occupants on government land, thereby obstructing completion of the road.”
The minister also talked of deploying an independent agency to apprise the 78 occupants about the special package offered by the Port for their resettlement and convince them about requirement of road for development of their area and economic growth of the State.
Vasan pointed out that 4-laning of almost entire stretch of 18.3 km of the National Highway from Verna to Sada junction has been completed, except the last stretch of 5.2 km from Baina to Sada. He said 4-laning of the Verna-Sada junction stretch is held up because of inability of the State government to hand over vacant possession of the land to NHAI which is executing the project.
The Mormugao Port had in fact already paid the cost of rehabilitation of the project affected persons and it is even ready to pay the escalated cost of rehabilitation of Rs 12 crore on account of delay on the part of the State government, the minister added.