The civic body does not care to relocate the fair even as cries for the same grew louder this year with the traffic authorities joining the citizens in asking the MMC to do a rethink on the fair along the roadside and footpaths.
The Chairman of Green Goa Foundation Raison Almeida is bracing up once again to take the civic body to the High Court in a contempt petition, the Margao traffic cell too has come out strongly against the roadside fair on grounds of traffic snarls and congestion.
The Margao Municipal Council does not seem to have immediate plans to relocate the fair. Authorities and citizens alike say the fair could be very well relocated at the sprawling South Goa Planning and Development Authority grounds as strongly recommended by the traffic cops, but the municipality has no such immediate plan, fearing that the civic body would lose revenue to the tune of Rs 10-odd lakh generated from each fair at the Old Market.
DySP Traffic, Guruprasad Mhapne says, “The traffic police had written to the District Magistrate as well as the Margao civic body not to hold the fair along the roadside at the Old Market, but in vain. We had even recommended that the stretch of road from the KTC bus stand to Old Market Circle should not host the fair, but the MMC refuses to budge”.
The traffic police say that they are hard pressed to man the Old Market traffic junction considering the teaming traffic and thousands of people who throng the seven-day fair.
Sources in the Traffic Department said the Traffic Cell has no option but to deploy 10 men and officers to regulate the traffic flow at Old Market, leaving other junctions unattended.
Almeida, who had taken the civic body to the High Court, for granting stalls along the footpaths, disclosed plans to file a contempt petition against the municipality, yet again. “The civic body has turned a blind eye to the High Court directions. I am sending a legal notice on the civic body on the contempt petition,” Raison said.
