Team Herald
PANJIM: The State government on Friday requested the National Green Tribunal (NGT) for a six-month extension, till February 29, 2020, to finalise and submit the Coastal Zone Management Plan (CZMP) to the Union Ministry of Environemnt, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC). NGT had set August 31 as the deadline to all States, including Goa, to submit its coastal plan.
Environment Director Johnson Fernandes, in an application filed before NGT Principal Bench on Friday, has sought extension of a further six months time for the correction of the draft CZMP, 2011 prepared by Chennai-based agency National Center for Sustainable Coastal Managment (NCSCM) and to carry out public consultations on it.
Fernandes said the delay in submission of the CZMP to MoEF&CC is neither deliberate nor willful but circumstantial.
He informed the tribunal that the Environment Department has recieved letters from around 100 village panchayats and about 169 representations from NGOs and civil society groups, private
individuals, etc regarding scrapping of the draft CZMP prepared by NCSCM.
“During the presentation held with the MLAs, they also expressed that there are errors in the preparation of the draft CZMP, 2011 by NCSCM, especially regarding demarcation of the high tide line beyond sluice gate in khazan land and thus requested that the said maps should be referred back to NCSCM for further study and correction,” the director said.
He also said that the government decided to cancel the public consultation on the draft plan, scheduled on July 7.
“Accordingly, Minister for Environment (Nilesh Cabral) directed the Environment Department to have taluka level presentation to explain to general public the provisions of CRZ notification, 2011 in respect of preparation of draft CZMP. There was opposition from the public for the said presentation and request was made by all local bodies that they would prepare their own CZMP,” Fernandes stated.
He said that in order to have effective public consultation for preparation of the draft CZMP, the department requested NCSCM to provide soft copies of the village level maps of the plan in shape file format and the digital aerial photography of Survey of India carried out in year 2011-12.
He said that department also wrote to Society of Integrated Coastal Managment (SICOM) seeking the same aerial data and it is still awaited.
The State submitted that the plans provided by NCSCM are in the nature of grids, which are difficult to read and understand and hence some private agencies have been approached to connect the grids and make a consolidated village map.
“We have also written to NCSCM on August 29 calling on them to provide us the village maps within the period of four working days failing which we will engage the private agency to prepare the village map for submission to the villages for better understanding of the plans,” Fernandes said.
He also said that the Environment Minister has approached the Secretary MoEF&CC to intervene and prevail upon the NCSCM to send to us village wise maps.
