Across Goa, the pain of its people is seen and heard daily. Everyone is knocking on several doors for justice either for themselves or for their land.
If the land is our mother, she is in pain. She suffers. She cries. And yet she cannot look to the one she trusted, to look after her, to govern and to protect.
And yet the powerful are getting richer, each contract bringing in money enough for several generations, money that is often parked abroad (for investment purposes of course). But let us ask this. When people of Goa are suffering, what is the point of some powerful people swimming in hundreds of crores?
Governance is not about policy announcements, or quoting figures. Governance is simply about bringing a smile to the weakest and filling the person at the bottom of the ladder with a hope that justice will prevail and she won’t be wronged.
The opposite of that is being witnessed, in villages and towns across Goa. Ask our fishermen, across the coast from Benaulim to Betim, why there is no fish waters and they will tell you that rogue fishing vessels with LED lights have taken all the fish away and do so daily, our farmers are losing land to acquisitions for highways and other projects, many of them meant to transport goods and coal for big daddies with no benefit to Goa. Our age old Khazan lands in Loutolim are being surrendered, thereby destroying agrarian ecosystems that helped out ecology and cultivation.
A land grabber with multiple criminal cases Suleman Siddiqui is escorted out of the Crime Branch by a police constable. And he in turn releases two videos, one of which holds a senior politician and top cops of torturing him and yet there is no direct action on anyone but a constable for allowing a criminal, to simply, walk out of prison. Surely the constable could not have planned this on his own and dared to facilitate this escape as a solo act. This is not failed, but non-existent governance.
THE HIGH COURT IS FORCED TO
GOVERN THE STATE, WHEN THE
GOVERNMENT DOESN’T
In North Goa, even the might of the Court hasn’t yet been able to snuff out the menace of noise pollution. At each hearing, promises are made but the dream of having noise control machines at every potential noise-polluting night club with real-time monitoring by the Pollution Control Board is lost in a jungle of excuses. The High Court is teaching the government how to govern. It has asked the Anjuna police to get CCTV footage of establishments playing music beyond 10 pm and take action and do surprise checks on establishments against whom people have complained.
Does a functioning government need the High Court to teach the basics? Doesn’t it indicate that the system is there for the violators and not those who have been violated- the common people?
Goa’s biggest current shame is its capital Panjim. In a callous, reckless manner the pride of Goa, Panjim has been destroyed and its civic infrastructure hacked. Virtually every deadline given to the public and courts about completing roads dug multiple times over three year, has failed. The dug portions have claimed lives and injured others. High Court judges had to take to the streets and inspect road works. And yet to no avail. Finally, citizens of Panjim were forced to knock the doors of the court, when dust pollution from the road mess was harming them and their family members.
It is surely a slap on Goa’s governance when the High Court asks the Advocate General to indicate that clear timelines have not been adhered to for completing all the road-works and asks him to give reasons for the delay. If this is not a failure of governance, where the court is forced to intervene to solve executive incompetence, then what is?
It is Governance or the lack of it which is also linked to the on-the-ground reality of the deteriorating tourism experience. The Tourism Minster, emphasising that influencers were deliberately giving Goa a bad name, said 99.41 lakh domestic and 4.67 lakh foreign tourists arrived in Goa. And that the number of domestic tourists increased by 22 per cent, while the number of foreign tourists rose by 3 per cent.
If these numbers have been collected from information from airlines, airports and hotels, how can it be assumed that all those entering Goa are tourists? Among those who enter Goa are Goans who live here, Goans who work elsewhere and come home, people here for business conferences, weddings, etc.
This year was the year of the Exposition of the relics of Saint Francis Xavier which drew a large number of domestic and foreign tourists. This too bumped up the numbers. But numbers are not the point.
‘TOURISTS’ WHO SLEEP IN CARS
DON’T BRING MONEY TO GOA
But let us hear what Goans, of whom many from the tourism industry said, witnessed on December 31. The streets were not even half as full as yesteryears. One restaurant owner who took 30 minutes to travel 5 km from his home to his restaurant in Candolim took just seven minutes this year and he witnessed the restaurants half empty. At the same time, he saw people drinking and some even sleeping in their cars- their makeshift hotel rooms. Are these tourists improving our economy? So where are the real tourists? Surely not in North Goa.
One senior manager of a five-star chain in North Goa remarked that major hotels had to reduce their room tariffs four times to reach “survival level occupancy”. Meanwhile two tourism professionals from Goa, on a holiday in Sri Lanka spoke of how Colombo was buzzing with foreigners with no space in hotels and restaurants. These are not influencers but senior Goan hospitality professionals. Are they also defaming Goa? Why would they?
INFRASTRUCTURE AND APP TAXIS
IS A PART OF CIVILISED TOURISM.
WHEN CAN WE GET THAT?
Infrastructure is the key. When roads are crumbling, there’s filth and garbage and construction everywhere, tourists will get disheartened. Getting app-based taxis and metered taxis is a part of that very infrastructure. And this is all about Governance. When will Goa see this governance so that tourists, whatever the numbers, go back with a better experience and spend more time and money in consuming that experience, with the economy of Goa benefitting?
All that the common Goan wants is to get governance back on the streets, in police stations and government offices. We cannot continue to destroy our motherland while the rich and powerful get filthy rich and richer and park their ill-gotten wealth on foreign shores.