TEAM HERALD
teamherald@herald-goa.com
PANJIM: The Mayor of the Corporation of the City of Panaji, Surendra Furtado, has written to Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar asking for advice and guidance regarding the land occupied by the Military in Panjim. He has also written to the Union Defence Minister asking him to direct the Military to return the land occupied by it in the capital.
Referring to a total land area of 4969 sq mt, the mayor said that the State government while allotting the extra land at Bambolim to the Defence forces during the tenure of Chief Minister Pratapsing Rane, had made it a pre-condition that the land occupied by the Army at Panjim “shall be vacated and handed over to the then Panjim Municipal Council, the original owners of this land.”
am to submit that prior to Liberation of Goa the land in the heart of this city and described below was in the possession and ownership of the erstwhile Camara Municipal de Goa which was converted to Panjim Municipal Council and now known as Corporation of the City of Panaji,” Furtado said in the letter to the Defence Minister A K Anthony, adding, “However, after Liberation this land is now in the possession of 2 Signal Training Centre adjacent to their Panjim Headquarters which is underutilized for parking of military vehicles which are very few in number.”
Stating that the Corporation is at present having acute parking problems “with the increasing number of vehicles in the city, this town being an attraction for tourists from all over the world, we are facing acute problem of space for parking of these vehicles of the tourists coming into the city besides the vehicles of the local residents.”
The Corporation in its meeting held on July 31, 2013 had passed an unanimous resolution to make a request to the Defence Ministry to return the above land to this Corporation for utilizing this land for multi-level car parking.
The mayor has asked the chief minister for his “guidance, advice and support on the above subject matter as to how to go about with this proposal for return of the said land. As the MLA of Panjim it would be commendable if you support this cause pro-actively.”
“It would be nice of you to also write to the Defence Minister urging him to return the land which originally belongs to the Camara Municipal de Goa, says in the letter to the chief minister.
