Team Herald
SIOLIM: The Marna-Siolim panch members had to ask for the police to mediate their gram sabha on Sunday, after the heated arguments over the frequent power-cuts and load shedding in the village, that locals blamed on the construction of mega-projects. “The recent power outage went on for three days. We are being subjected to load shedding due to the mega projects which use a huge number of ACs and other appliances,” said a local, calling for the panchayat to ban these projects until power and water supply infrastructure is in place.
Sarpanch Sharmila Vernekar replied that the panchayat cannot stop issuing licenses to projects approved by the Town and Country Planning Department. She added that the power and water woes would be addressed by underground cabling and completion of the water treatment plant. They also called for action against restaurants that play loud music in the village and disturb their peace.
When the panchayat began constituting various committees, there was a mad rush to get nominated to the Village Development Committee (VDC), while the other committees had no takers. There was another uproar when the Sarpanch initially refused to discuss the minutes of the previous gram sabha. A local, Amrut Agarwadekar, hit out at the authorities that points raised on corruption and illegalities were never taken seriously. He also alleged misappropriation of VDC funds, casting serious aspersions on the sarpanch. This led to an altercation and Agarwadkar was escorted out of the sabha.
