The decision of Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority (GCZMA) to write to the National Centre for Scientific Coastal Management (NCSCM), an agency entrusted with the job of drawing up coastal plans, not to include any structures and the demarcation of port limits in the draft plan, could give a new direction to the exercise which till now has triggered controversies.
The GCZMA view is significant particularly if depicting structures and showing the port limits is not relevant to the final coastal plan. However, it remains a mystery why the government invited the wrath of people by placing before them a draft that is flawed and inconsistent vis-Ã -vis dwellings and structures.
Goa’s landscape has gone through a sea change since the 1970s and it would require an exhaustive ground-truthing survey to update plans and do justice to current structures. Given the quantum of errors shown in plans, it would be a painstaking and long exercise, running into years, if reconciliation is being sought.
Interestingly, the GCZMA also resolved that the ‘port limits’ too need not be shown in the coastal plan. We agree the MPT ‘port limits’ has changed in recent years after it was first notified vide a notification in 1963. The contention is that other States have not shown structures and ports limits in the coastal plans. It appears that Environment Minister Nilesh Cabral did not do his homework because this is a crisis that could easily have been avoided. The NCSCM should have been engaged to find solutions, and protocols followed by other States which have completed their coastal plans should have been studied.
Against the backdrop of a huge trust deficit build-up against the government, the GCZMA move to exclude structures and ‘port limits’ from the draft would be met with scepticism, and could vitiate the environment further, especially because the government has always tried to rush through the process of public hearings. The decision not to show structures, and more significantly, an attempt to blank the MPT port limits from the coastal plan will now be seen with suspicion.
The ‘port limits’ may not be a new demarcation and the MPT’s contention that it existed since the 60s holds, but the passing of the Major Ports Bill recently and the developments like abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A in Jammu and Kashmir, and the passing of Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill, 2021 are all signs of how the Centre is moving to extend its reach and assume control. Fears of MPT taking control of Goa’s coastal expanse run on similar lines.
Assurances of writing to the Centre and pleading Goa’s case because of the smaller size of the State have no merit when the bill has been passed by both the Houses of Parliament and awaits Presidential assent. The State government doesn’t have the political firepower too to seek an amendment. The ‘port limits’ is here to stay.
The GCZMA resolutions will give some breathing space to the State government to rework its strategy on the coastal plan. However, it remains to be seen how it braces up to this challenge with a modified draft.
