PANJIM: The Town & Country Planning (TCP) Minister, Vishwajit Rane, on Tuesday tabled the much-awaited land conversion report on the floor of the House. However, the ‘comprehensive report’ refrains from directly indicting former minister Michael Lobo and those government officials involved in the scam.
While the report was tabled amidst apprehensions that the government might go soft on Lobo after his defection move last weekend, Rane said that another Committee headed by the Chief Secretary will conduct an inquiry to hold the culprits responsible.
Later in the evening, Rane spoke to reporters at the Assembly complex. “While all the illegally converted survey numbers have been reverted to their original status, these will also be blacklisted,” he said.
“The Committee appointed under Chief Town Planner (CTD) has unearthed a massive scale of land destruction. Illegalities were indeed committed. Multiple findings are annexed with the report along with recommendations,” he said. Adding that he was deliberately not naming any politician or government official/officer involved in the illegality, the minister hinted at Lobo stating, “The Committee has carried out a transparent process of inquiry during which inspections were carried out in Calangute, Nagoa, Arpora, Parra and Candolim. Conversion of land has taken place.”
The minister further added that the survey numbers, under the government’s scrutiny, have been blacklisted unless there is a reason to go back on the decision. The decision is also kept open for the public to appeal, if any, within a period of 60 days.
Indicating the government’s seriousness to bring a logical end to the alleged fraud, he said that the government will submit an affidavit before the Court pertaining to the decision.
The minister is also expected to make a statement on the controversial Section 16B of the TCP Act on July 18. He reiterated his earlier claim that certain people not only converted their land but are also partners in the conversion of others’ land in North Goa. Rane had recently stated that an additional settlement area around Calangute, Candolim, Arpora, Nagoa, and Parra was converted to various zones from tenanted land, no development zones, mangroves, cultivable land, etc. Moreover, huge tracts of land were also converted into orchards, no-development-zone, and agricultural land, from their actual status of settlement land.
