CANACONA
The State government’s plan to set up a Film City on the Bhagwati plateau in Loliem got a big boost as the executive body of the comunidade on Sunday resolved to hand over land to the Entertainment Society of Goa.
A proposal will now be submitted to the ESG to set up a Film City on comunidade land at Loliem.
Sunday’s comunidade decision assumes significance as residents had earlier resolved not to permit any development on the Bhagwati plateau, which is rich in biodiversity.
Speaking to The Goan, Loliem Comunidade President Vishwajeet Warik
said, “the meeting was good… we decided to submit a proposal to the ESG for a ‘Film City’ on comunidade land at Loliem”.
He said, we will submit our proposal to ESG. “ESG will then have to decide from the various proposals they might receive from elsewhere in the State… If they consider our proposal, we will do the necessary process”, he added.
Asked whether the consent of the panchayat and the gram sabha would be needed, Warik replied in the negative. “As of now we don’t know whether ESG will positively consider our proposal or not”, he said.
As reported by The Goan on Sunday, the meeting was scheduled to commence at 10 am but started half an hour late and had more than double the quorum required.
At the meeting a detailed explanation was given to the components that had a few queries on the issue. Thereafter, the matter was settled and the comunidade components unanimously decided on the proposal to hand over the land to ESG.
Considering that the Film City would be a prestigious project, Loliem is abuzz that some private property owners have also submitted or are in the process of making offers of their properties to ESG.
Warik confirmed this saying, “yes, there are many proposals but nothing has materialised as such. I heard many proposals are going from Loliem itself but most of them (proposals) lack the required feasibility”.
“Nothing has happened till now. ESG’s base requirement of land is 250 acres which literally means 10 lakh sq mts… only Loliem Comunidade has that amount of land”, he added.
It may be recalled that Loliem villagers had passed a resolution in the Gram Sabha a few years ago not to permit any development on Bhagwati Plateau.
Earlier in July, Social Welfare Minister Subhash Phaldessai had also visited the Bhagwati Plateau and had claimed that the “barren land” could be utilised by the government for the IIT project, Film City or some hinterland tourism project.
