Team Herald
VASCO: High voltage drama was witnessed at Sancoale on Sunday morning between Comunidade of Sancoale and locals after the former tried to dump mud and block the road claiming that local residents were trying to encroach on their land. However, locals sat in front of the trucks and did not allow the mud to be dumped.
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The trouble started when the managing committee members of Comunidade of Sancoale started dumping mud by trucks to block the road used by the residential colony situated near Kala Bhavan. The Comunidade claimed that local residents were trying to encroach on their land in the name of the road when they already had a road prepared while developing the plots.
Noticing the trucks dumping mud, the residents rushed out and stopped the trucks claiming that the road was a traditional access for the area. They sat in front of the trucks and did not allow the mud to be dumped.
Verna police headed by PI Diago Gracias rushed to the site and pacified both the warrying parties. He also spoke to Mormugao Deputy Collector, who has now called both the parties for a joint meeting on Monday.
The Comunidade of Sancoale members said that the residential colony already had a road access when the plots were developed and alleged that the residents encroaching on the Comunidade land to create a shortcut route.
Jayesh Phadte, a share holder of Comunidade of Sancoale, said, “I don’t know what is the interest of the locals to use the Comunidade land when they already have an approved road. The land belongs to shareholders and the residents are trying to grab our land in the name of road.”
Former Chicalim sarpanch and Comunidade of Sancoale president Pratap Mardolkar said that the Comunidade land cannot be offered to anybody without genuine reasons and that the general body had decided to develop the property into plots and a file was already sent to the District Collector through the Administrator of Comunidades, South Zone, Margao.
Mardolkar said that as per the Code of Comunidades, the residents have to make a formal request to the Comunidade for land and it is the general body which will discuss the matter and approve the request, if required.
Another shareholder John Philip Pereira said that Comunidade can give land only if any other property area is landlocked and that too a five-metre wide road can be granted in that case. He said that the residential colony already had an access road to their property from the main road and that there is no chance that Comunidade land can be given to them.
