the goan I network
PANAJI
The shack policy of the Tourism Department pegging the total number of the popular temporary restaurants on Goa’s beaches at 364 got legal sanctity and a sense of finality with it being published in the official gazette earlier this week, after decades of uncertainty and controversy.
The policy articulates several conditions on the licencee and also sets the quantum of fees for the shacks and huts in private properties as well. It also gives the license a tenure of three years from 2019 to 2022.
According to the policy, the structures will be allowed to be set up in the period between September 1 and May 31, by which date operations have to compulsorily stop and the structures dismantled and removed by June 10.
Exact locations will be allotted annually to the licencees after a joint inspection by officials of the tourism department and the Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority
(GCZMA).
However, for the purpose of ‘experience’ licences will be issued in the name of deceased persons, provided the applicant is either the spouse, son, daughter a legal heir.
Increase or decrease of the number of shacks on each of the beaches will only be determined by the GCZMA and will be updated on the tourism department’s website as and when the change is effected, the policy says.
Also only those with three or more years of having operated shacks in the past will be allotted 90 per-cent of the number of shacks while the balance 10 per-cent will go to those with lesser years of experience or none at all.
Other conditions imposed on the beach shack allottee include mandatory provision of fire cover to the beach shack structure and also prohibition of discharge of dirty water, liquid, sewage from Compulsory installation of portable toilets, maintenance of CCTV footage record of at least last 30 days.
Meanwhile, at the turtle nesting beaches identified by Forest Department such as Morjim, Mandrem, Galgibag and Agonda, licences will not be granted without the specific permission from the GCZMA.
If indeed permitted on these turtle-nesting beaches, the beach shacks will be prohibited from
installing any outdoor illumination and the indoor lighting also should be muted with opaque shields on the sea facing side.
