BENAULIM: Distressed by the sight of the huge piles of plastic bags waste and other garbage littering the pristine coastal beach stretch of Vaddie or Trinity in Benaulim, the assistant parish priest of Holy Trinity Church, Fr Milagres Dias along with his parishioners comprising mostly youth and other church association volunteers commenced on the enormous task of cleaning the beach of this nuisance.
Speaking to Herald, the environment activist Fr Dias expressed his disgust and dismay on the sight of these plastic bags waste washed ashore littering on the Vaddie beach. According to him it was first time he encountered such nature’s wrath in three years since he was appointed in the Holy Trinity Church, Benaulim parish). He approached the youth members. Seven members started the beach cleaning drive and on Friday. On Saturday he was joined by all my parishioners and around 45 including the youth brigade completed the cleaning drive. “We gathered more than 1,000 kilos of garbage since it was mixed with wet sand.”
Unfortunately, these volunteers received no assistance from the Benaulim village panchayat for this noble deed during rains with the youth and other volunteers wearing raincoats quickly gathering the garbage from the beach stretch from the Taj Exotica resort to Maria Hall in Benaulim with their bare hands and using rakes before it was washed back into the sea.
“We requested our local ward panch member Xavier Pereira to help us dispose it as the panch member had assured us to do so. But it has not been done. They are now claiming that the Tourism department will take the collected garbage. One of the fishermen, Pele Fernandes, pointed out that if the monsoons downpour continued for another two days, it will be washed back into the sea in the high tide, so we quickly hurried with this garbage cleaning drive. Pele also assisted us on the first day of this drive,” said Fr Dias.
A youth member from the Benaulim Trinity Choir, Jonathan Barretto remarked, “Garbage has left a stinking mark in most places of Goa and it didn’t leave our pristine beaches, too. Despite the rains, we managed to clean the stretch of beach from Taj resort till the main Benaulim beach. The happiness of being a part of such a great initiative is immense. This wasn’t new to us. We used to do this for the past many years. From this year, we had started cleanliness drives in our village every Sunday but we had to conclude it in April as the second wave struck in.”
“We informed about it to the local authorities many times but it never used to be done. There’s no shame in doing this, rather we are proud. Our only concern is people should be responsible for their own garbage. It’s high time we properly segregate our garbage and work to make this place a better place to live in,” said Jonathan.
Another youth member, Konrad Rodrigues claimed that taking care of the environment is his way of manifesting my patriotism. He regretted that a lot of selfish, self-centered criminals ungratefully destroy his motherland by deliberately and habitually throwing garbage in public areas, beaches, springs, roadsides, etc. It is unfair that government uses tax payers’ money to correct their mistakes instead of punishing them or fining them with a whopping amount, say Rs 50,000.
“Goa government has not shown any interest or intentions to solve the garbage and pollution problems. They could easily bring in a law that severely punishes criminal who dump garbage and increase the fines so that the same money could be used for the development of our State. In the past, BJP was known to pass a law that classified a coconut tree into grass, so it’s not that difficult. I believe passing such a law won’t hurt anyone’s religious sentiments or cause loss of life due to it’s implementation. Instead it will save a lot of tax payers money spent on garbage collection,” said Rodrigues.
He warned that if steps are not been taken to control the problem, tourism industry will be doomed after mining industry. “We cannot invite tourists to our State which is strewn with filth and garbage everywhere, unless our Tourism Minister, Health Minister and Urban Development Minister want to promote ‘Garbage Tourism.’ I hope and wish our Goan law makers take note of the problem and start taking measures to solve it,” concluded Rodrigues.
