the goan I network
PANAJI
The Goa Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) on Wednesday submitted a letter to the Chief Secretary Dharmendra Sharma and the Member Secretary of the Goa Coastal Management Authority (GCMA) requesting them to solicit opinions of Goans before finalising the government’s stand on the draft Coastal Regulatory Zone (CRZ) notification.
In their letter, the Congress stated that the central government appeared very high-handed on the matter of the CRZ draft notification and did not consult the states before drafting the draft notification.
Furthermore, the said draft notification which was sent to the state, Congress said, had not seen the state of Goa deliberating on the issue by involving all stakeholders, i.e. the people in general, and the local self governments like village panchayats, gram sabhas, municipalities, and zilla panchayats.
GPCC President Girish Chodankar said that it was
the duty of the state government to take all possible measures to solicit and elicit peoples’ opinions and only then take a stand on the draft notification.
“The process needs to be rooted in collective participation,” Chodankar wrote.
