VASCO: Goencho Ekvott group members along with the villagers and the landlords managed to abort the controversial railway double tracking work at Hollant, which falls in Velsao-Pale-Issorcim panchayat area on Tuesday afternoon. Locals alleged that the Railways is being involved in chopping trees from private land to which locals reacted.
As per the information and details given by Orville Dourado Rodrigues of Goencho Ekvott group, some personnel from Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd. who were present along with the armed Railway Protection Force were advised by the landlords and the villagers from Issorcim and Hollant not to trespass in private properties as it might trigger a law and order situation.
Furthermore, Orville stated that Goencho Ekvott suggested the RVNL not to resume any work related to double tracking without the authorisation of the local panchayats along the route since Railways has not done Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) and Social Impact Assessment (SIA).
“After, much discussion between RNVL RPF personnel and villagers, the railway personnel gave patient hearing to what people had to say. They also listened to the issues raised by Goencho Ekvott regarding the land rights and agreed to forward any communications received from their higher ups to Goencho Ekvott and the team thereafter dispersed from the site” he added.
Meanwhile, Olencio Simoes general secretary of Goencho Ekvott accused RVNL of bypassing the law and doing whatever they please against the permission of the local bodies. It is high time that State govt should take action on the RVNL personnel for allegedly trespassing and chopping of trees from private land.
Efforts were made to get comment from S.Banerji of RVNL about the incident but he disclosed that he was unaware about the matter.
