NCM warns intervention over Kabrastan issue

MARGAO, MARCH 24
The National Commission for the Minorities has threatened to invoke provisions of the National Commission for Minorities Act, 1992 if the Goa government fails to make any headway on the question of allotment of land for a Kabrastan for the Muslim community in the Commercial Capital.
The Commission has taken serious note of the repeated failures by the Goa government to reply to its correspondence since July 2007.
In fact, Commission’s Joint secretary S K Swami, in a letter to the Chief Secretary drew his attention to the fact that the Commission has received no reply from the government despite the considerable lapse of time since July 2009.
Swami has now requested the chief secretary to dispatch the requisite report on the demand from the Muslim community for a Kabrastan in Margao failing which he said the Commission may consider to take action under the relevant provisions of the NCM Act, 1992 for issue of summons.
Incidentally, the National Commission for the Minorities had last year written a letter to the Chief Minister on the long-pending demand of the Muslim community for spacious land for a kabrastan, but Kamat had feigned ignorance on the Commission’s letter.
Margao’s Muslim community had been demanding alternate land for a burial ground as the existing kabrastan atop the Pajifond hillock is saturated.
So far, government’s proposal to set up the kabrastan in Margao and the outskirts of the city has met with strong opposition from the local residents.