the goan I network
MAPUSA
Upset villagers of Anjuna blamed the panchayat for failing to give adequate publicity to Sunday’s gram sabha even as Sarpanch Savio Almeida maintained that enough measures were taken to inform the public about the meet.
Panch member Hanumant Govekar said that they were served notices about the gram sabha meeting on August 10.
“On August 14, we were asked to send our proposals to be discussed at the gram sabha meeting. With holidays on August 15 and 17, the public were left with just 2 days to submit proposals,” Govekar said.
Local Ramesh Naik informed that Anjuna panchayat was known for skipping gram sabhas in the past. “Now, they deliberately refuse to give publicity to gram sabhas because they don’t want people to attend,” Naik said.
Sarpanch Savio Almeida, however, told The Goan that adequate steps were taken to notify the public.
“We have fixed notices of the gram sabha in the temples and churches. It was announced in the church last Sunday and this Sunday too. We have also advertised in the newspapers,” Almeida said.
On Sunday, besides confirming the minutes of last gram sabha, no other issue was discussed and the meeting was concluded within half an hour.
The sarpanch hurried through a proposal of urgent repair of road from Hotel Tamarind, stating that all road works will be taken up after monsoon.
He rejected two other proposals claiming that they had nothing to do with development and the information sought could be collected personally from the panchayat.
A local, Sanjay Narvekar had sought information about permissions issued to new restaurants and guest houses in the village in 2017-18 while another local, Ankit Salgaonkar had asked for a list of illegal constructions identified in the village in 2017-18 and what action was taken against them.
Both of their requests were rejected.
A villager, Michael D’Souza said that he had written to the panchayat to place the appointment of a woman member in the bio-diversity management committee in the gram sabha agenda.
The panchayat, however, failed to do so.
“This decision to appoint a woman member in the bio-diversity committee has been postponed for the third time today,” D’Souza said.
