MARGAO
Can Saxtti lone Minister, Alexio Sequeira, who presides over the Environment portfolio, bring a turnaround in Salcete’s mega retail market “ the SGPDA fish, vegetable, fruit and meat market at Margao?
The SGPDA retail market was in the news a week ago after the Goa State Pollution Control Board (GSPCB), coming under the Environment Ministry, issued show cause notices to over a dozen meat stalls, including chicken, beef, mutton and pork stalls at the SGPDA for discharge of waste water and over their failure to obtain the Board’s Consent to Operate.
The Environment Minister personally intervened in the matter when he brought the meat vendors and GSPCB officials to facilitate a dialogue and set in motion the process wherein the meat traders apply to the Pollution control Board for consent to operate.
Sequeira expressed his satisfaction that the initiative has helped to evolve a solution with the meat traders applying to the Board for consent to operate.
A visit to the SGDPA market shows that apart from the meat stalls, Saxtti’s mega market owned by the Planning body is craving for attention. Hundreds of Sunday shoppers to the mega market must have come across garbage dumped around the market border, spilling over to the adjoining fields; market footpaths littered with filth and waste, fish waste awaiting disposal et al.
For the shoppers, the stinking environment may not be something news, with no sign of a turnaround forthcoming for months now.
While the GSPCB had been quick in issuing show cause notices to the erring meat traders and other shop owners in the Osia market complex for their failure to obtain the Board’s consent to operate and for discharging waste water in the drains, questions are raised whether the Pollution control board had at any time issued similar show cause notices to the SGPDA on the question of obtaining consent to operate or for leaving the market in a filthy state.
With no action forthcoming against the SGPDA and absence of coordination between the PDA and the Margao Municipal Council over waste collection, shoppers as well as vendors have been left to fend for themselves as stink pervades the market.
The Environment Minister told the media at the Friday darbar at the South Collectorate that the SGDPA has applied to the GSPCB for consent to operate. Not just traders, but shoppers pin their hopes on the Environment Minister and the GSPCB to take cognisance of the conditions in the SGPDA retail market and bring about a turnaround in Salcete’s biggest retail market.
