PANJIM: The displaced Goa Medical College and Hospital (GMCH), Bambolim fruit and vegetable vendors on Saturday threatened to agitate if the newly built kiosks are not handed over to them with immediate effect.
Addressing media persons near GMCH, kiosk owner Domnic Pereira said, “It’s been more than a month since the contractor has handed over new kiosks to the PWD.”
“If the construction work of new kiosks is over and the file is handed over to the PWD why there is so much delay in allotting kiosks to the vendors,” Domnic asked.
Informing that the vendors are completely helpless without this business, Domnic said, “The kiosk owners had approached the PWD officials to find out the reason behind this delay but claimed that didn’t receive any satisfactory answer.”
“We were informed that the file has been sent to the Office of Collectorate and the allotment of space will be done by the Collector. If the file has been sent to the Office of Collectorate, a month ago, then does it take a whole month for a file to move from one office to another,” Domnic questioned.
Thanking government for supporting the kiosk owners at every stage, he said, “The government had gone out of the way to help us rehabilitate by constructing new kiosks. All these days, the vendors were sitting in open space to sell their products. Now that the monsoon is almost arrived, it is becoming difficult for us to sit in open space and sell the goods.”
“We request the government to look into the matter and allocate these kiosks to us at the earliest,” Domnic added.
It may be recalled, around a year ago, kiosk owners had agitated outside the GMCH for removing illegal kiosks lined up outside GMCH. The stir was suspended after receiving the rehabilitation assurance from Chief Minister Dr Pramod Sawant.
