PROPOSED COLVA PAY PARKING
Benaulim MLA Venzy Viegas pledging his support to the movement of Colva villagers to oppose the pay parking project.
MARGAO
Benaulim MLA Venzy Viegas said the message from the extra ordinary gram sabha of the Colva Panchayat is loud and clear to the government to scrap the proposed pay parking fee project at the world famous beach.
Saying the government should explore other avenues to generate revenue, the Benaulim MLA said that introducing pay parking at the iconic beach is certainly not the right step to enrich the government coffers.
Slamming the government for notifying the pay parking project without taking the people into confidence, Venzy said the government has preferred to ignore the coastal MLAs while taking decisions having implications on the local communities.
“This is not the right way of introducing pay parking, How can they tax their own people going to the beach”, he said.
Asserting that tourism is suffering at Colva because of the traffic cell, the Benaulim MLA pointed out that he had raised the issue within the Assembly and outside, but in vain.
“Colva beach is an iconic beach and a hub for people to descend at the beach with families. Not only from Colva, people from entire South Goa and also from the north visit Colva. We have to take care of Colva. If there is haphazard parking, it can be taken care of separately, but certainly not by introducing pay parking”, he added.