Ease of travel
The road starting from Holy Family church junction at Porvorim to Kadamba bus terminal and beyond, was dug up a month ago for cabling and pipeline works and temporarily closed for outgoing traffic. A few days later the road was re-opened but left without being properly levelled and riddled with potholes and wide cracks, making it difficult for motorists and two wheelers to drive, and endangering the lives of pedestrians. To make matters worse, the road is being watered to keep the dust down resulting in a lot of muddy water puddles which keep splashing up while driving. As the condition of the road keeps worsening by the day bringing traffic to a standstill along the entire stretch, the temporary barrier at the O’Coqueiro circle should be opened up to allow traffic from B B Borkar road to proceed to CHOGM road and Mapusa , to ease the flow of traffic and the jam at the Holy Family Church junction, until such time that the road in question is repaired and hot-mixed.
A F Nazareth, Porvorim
Assure cleanliness at bus-stand:
The KTC bus-stand in Ponda happens to be an important one, with a large number of commuters occupying these premises on most occasions. However, the premises are not clean and tidy. This Sunday gone by, waste paper and empty pet bottles were noticed all over the platform. Even the adjacent drains were full of papers and unwanted material. No doubt, adequate dust-bins have already been provided at this major bus-stand, still commuters neglect to make use of the same.
Further, garbage in plenty is regularly being noticed by the roadside along the stretch of road from Farmagudi Circle towards KTC bus-stand. Public pay toilets have been constructed for the benefit of commuters, yet many defecate in open areas at the extreme side of this bus-stand. As a result, unhygienic conditions have become the order of the day here. In fact, the Ponda Municipal Council had undertaken Swachch Bharat Abhiyaan - Nital Goem’ drive sometime back. But the same has not yielded any favourable results. Unless this drive is restarted with greater enthusiasm and determination, it will be difficult to achieve positive results.
Pravin U Sardessai, Adpai
Pathetic conditions
There has been a lot written about the state of Mapusa and the deplorable condition of the market there. On a recent trip there, it was appalling to see how degraded the place is. The only place worse looking than the rear part of the Mapusa market is this one part in Chimbel which is flooded with migrant workers, most likely from all the construction projects taking place on the Kadamba Plateau and in the neighbouring areas. Both place in Goa reek of refuse and rotting organic materials. But, while Chimbel should not be neglected, the fact that Mapusa is being left to rot is a startling fact. How do the people of that town live and survive there when many of us who visit the place just once a week or a month can’t wait to get out of there? The lack of proper development there says a lot about the city fathers and the politicians who rule.
Bhushan Kamat, Panaji