All eyes are on what suggestions the Home Department will be bombarded with as the 15-day deadline nears closer this week. On August 13, the government issued a public notice inviting suggestions from the citizens on shifting of off-shore casinos vessels to any of four identified locations at Aguada Bay, or Rivers Zuari, Sal and Chapora.
In what could be a co-incidence or a deliberate move by the government, the deadline to submit the suggestions is exactly a day before Deltin Jaqk’s two year condition to shift to an alternate location or to stop its operations as a casino ends.
Until its recent U-turn, the government, in June had announced to suspend licenses of all the vessels that fail to move out of River Mandovi before their respective dates to relocate expires. Deltin Jaqk would have become the first to halt operations from August 30, 2015. Its deadline expires on August 29. M V Casino Pride 1, Deltin Royale and Casino Pride 2 would have followed in queue. Sources had said that these would, however, continue to anchor as ‘vessels sans operations’ until shifted.
However, the latest news – which Herald published in its August 19th edition –is that the government is yet to take a call whether or not to suspend their licenses. “The suggestions from the locals, like-minded people and stakeholders will help the government take a decision on where to shift the vessels. A notification in this regard was issued just recently. This is particularly the reason why the government has not decided whether to discontinue Deltin Jaqk’s operations,” a reliable source in the Home department told Herald.
The Ports Minister Dilip Parulekar commented that Ports Administration is awaiting a nod from the Home department over the relocation of the four vessels. “My department has already identified places for relocating the casino vessels. Now it is for the Home department to issue orders to CoP to shift the vessels. It is for the Home department to decide whether Deltin Jaqk will remain a vessel or licenses renewed,” he is quoted as saying to Herald.
The government has ironically not even finalized gaming commission, which was one of the promises during the 2012 elections. The Manohar Parrikar cabinet had promised Goans to shift vessels out of Mandovi by 2015-end while his successor Laxmikant Parsekar had once counter questioned the media whether on he had made this statement.
The issue, if the casinos shift to any of the four sites, will remain about how the local businesses like tourist taxis and hotels, etc would survive in the capital. The question is whether tourism will be affected in Panjim as a large chunk of tourists here also comprise of casino-goers.
Tourism Director Ameya Abhyankar is confident it won’t affect any tourism related business in the capital. “So far the government has not taken any decision on the shifting of casinos from River Mandovi. Even if these shift, and are relocated to other destinations, it will have no impact on tourism,” he said.
