The Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM) of Canacona who was also holding charge as the Chief Officer (CO) of Canacona Municipal Council (CMC), Chandrakant Shetkar has been transferred to Mapusa. His sudden transfer has raised many eyebrows and the citizens who hold no political affiliations have come out strongly against his transfer and they want him to be reinstated at Canacona.
Speaking to Herald, a senior citizen of Canacona, Natividade D’Sa said that in less than a year, Shetkar during his tenure undertook a lot of development work that included rejuvenation of the defunct garbage treatment at Dumanem. That apart, he was instrumental in keeping the town clean and had initiated the process of collection of door to door garbage in the municipal area.
It is learnt that many of the CMC councillors are from the business community and Shetkar’s move to hike taxes on commercial buildings, that was not revised for decades was taken in distaste and a move was taken by the councillors to shunt him away from Canacona. They succeeded in their mission. Leading businessman, Diego D’Silva said that Shetkar took up a lot of work including the cleanliness drive in and outside the courtyard of the Canacona Health Centre and at many places in the taluka.
Sources informed Herald that Shetkar used to work late hours and cleared long pending files at the SDM office and also at the CMC. A leading businessman in the taluka alleged that the transfer was politically motivated. According to him, Shetkar was a learned man and didn’t play the role of the ‘Pied Piper’ and thus fell short in the eyes of the politicians. He further said that Deputy Chief Minister, Francisco D’Souza who also holds the Urban Development (Municipalities) portfolio was not consulted and that he showed his resentment and anger on Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar for not consulting him on the transfer of gazetted officers in the state.
The people of Canacona, under the leadership of social activist, R F John have convened a meeting on Sunday at 5pm at Canacona to press for the demand to revert the transfer of Shetkar. According to sources, John will demand a permanent Chief Officer for Canacona Municipal Council.
For a brief period in the year 2013, Pereira was given full charge as CEO of CMC and prior to that and later on, all the CEOs were given additional charge and they used to visit the office twice in a week to attend to the vast CMC work. Many files were pending due to the paucity of time available to the designated officers.
