MAPUSA
The sarpanch of the outgoing panchayat and presently the administrator, Pratiksha Mayenkar, issued a notice under Section 82 of the Goa Panchayat Raj Act 1994 to Dnyaneshwar alias Raju Morajkar to stop illegal filling of the nullah and be present for the inspection on June 27 between 11.30 am and 12.30 pm.
In normal circumstances, the notice could have been passed off as a routine development, but in this case, the individual concerned who has been issued the notice is a BJP karyakarta and is contesting the panchayat polls from Ward 1, the election of which is on July 1.
The notice has been issued on the direction of the Block Development Officer, who had received a complaint against illegal filling of the nullah carried out by Morajkar.
Significantly, the BDO had issued a memorandum to the panchayat on March 6 asking the secretary to place the matter before the village panchayat fortnightly meeting for initiating necessary action.
He further directed the secretary to submit a detailed report on the subject to the BDO’s office within seven days of the memorandum. The question arises is that why did the panchayat delay in issuing notice to the alleged offender.
It may be recalled a local, Santosh Parab had filed a complaint before the deputy collector against Dnyaneshwar alias Raju Morajkar on February 27 for doing illegal filling of nullah thereby encroaching the nullah adjacent to his residential house at Tar Bridge junction.
In his complaint, Parab said that the act was completely illegal in nature and requested the authority concerned to initiate appropriate action on the alleged perpetrator.
Sources disclosed that the panchayat had removed a notice against Morajkar, but for some unknown reasons, the sarpanch-cum-administrator sat over it.
The Bastora Panchayat administrator, Pratiksha Mayenkar, attributed the delay due to failure to locate the complainant’s address.
“We could not locate the complainant’s whereabouts, as his presence was required for inspection of the site. I had signed the letter thrice but somehow we couldn’t issue it. But now we have issued the notice and scheduled the inspection,” Mayenkar said.
On Friday panchayat, authorities had to paste the notice on the door of Morajkar’s house as his house was found locked.
