VASCO: Mormugao councillors slammed Vasco MLA Carlos Almeida for doing nothing to ensure that Vasco made it to the Central government’s list of ‘smart cities’.
At the Mormugao Municipal Council’s (MMC) special meeting on Wednesday, councillors Manesh Arolkar and Saifullah Khan alleged that Almeida was focusing on development of his ward instead of securing Central government funds for Vasco, which deserved to be selected for the project.
“We had sent resolutions to the government to consider Vasco for the smart city project, but our MLA was only interested in doing a councillor’s job of cleaning gutters and building footpaths,” said Arolkar.
Khan advised Almeida to think as an MLA and not as a councillor. “It is true that our MLA is still representing ward number 17. He was possibly so focused on developing his ward that he did not understand the importance of the smart city project.”
Regarding the recently-concluded Saptah, Councillor Tara Kerkar said, “We had sent an application to the South Goa Collector seeking extension of Saptah from seven days to ten. However, the chief officer, possibly under pressure from the MLA, failed to reply to the Collector on the foolproof preparation for a 10-day Saptah, due to which the Collector refused our extension request.”
MMC resolved to give 50 percent house tax exemption to St Andrew’s Church and discussed the pending water bills of public toilets and taps sent to MMC by the PWD.
The council later adopted a resolution to ask the PWD to apply minimum charges on the bills. MMC decided to ask all 19 Sulabh Shouchalaya to pay their water bills.
