Pomburpa villagers take to streets in protest against mega housing project

MAPUSA: After Camurlim, now the villagers of Ecoxim-Pomburpa have hit the streets to protest against a mega housing project coming up on the hills in the village.

According to villagers, the mega project comprises 150 villas along with swimming pools, coming up in a No Development Zone (NDZ).

Since the last four days, a group of villagers including youth from Ecoxim-Pomburpa has been creating a door to door awareness on the project. The villagers said that they are forced to come out on the streets as they alleged that the panchayat has kept them in the dark on the project.

They further claimed that the project is completely illegal which will destroy the hills and forest in the village.

“The project is coming up on the hill, having 45 degree and above gradient, which is a No Development Zone. Despite this, the panchayat has gone ahead and granted permission for this project keeping the people in dark. The forest land is illegally converted into settlement. Hill cutting has been carried out which is completely illegal. A month ago, we had sought the documents of this project but panchayats is not ready to provide the same which has forced us to hit the road, Dhiren Phadte, a villager said.

“We demand that this project be scrapped because it is going to destroy the village. We don’t care whether the person who is carrying out the work is from Delhi or from anywhere. He is not above the villagers,” the locals added.

“Forget about taking the people into confidence, we were not even informed about the project. There are seven panch members but none of them informed us. They thought that people will remain silent quite but today we have moved out of our houses to fight against this project and to protect the village,” another villager said.

“Hundreds of trees are felled and the forest cover has been damaged. There are four springs in the village and wells which will get destroyed. We will not allow this project in the village,” Phadte pledged.

Phadte said that they are going to approach the High Court against this project.