the goan I network
PANAJI
Weeks after he ruffled feathers among Goa’s ruling politicos, Governor Satya Pal Malik on Saturday said he had consciously kept himself aloof from the ongoing Mhadei river water sharing controversy with Karnataka.
Malik also said, the State government was working for the State’s interest on the issue and was doing an earnest job.
“Do not put me in a controversy. I am for Goan people. What the Goa government is doing I fully support. Whatever help they need from me, I will fully help. This is not my job, but what the government and people need I will do,” Malik said to journalists on the sidelines of a Giants International event he graced at the Taleigao Community Hall.
Malik had ruffled feathers in the Pramod Sawant-led cabinet after he emerged a hero of sorts on the Mhadei issue when he raked up the subject at his first tete-a-tete with Prime Minister Narendra Modi after taking over the gubernatorial post in Goa.
The move acted as a catalyst and within a couple of days, the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change reversed a nod it had given to Karnataka for a drinking water project including a dam at Kalsa-Bandhura.
Malik came in for some stick at a subsequent Cabinet meeting where ministers raised objections to his stepping out of the realm of his domain as Governor. The issue also proffered the Opposition an opportunity to criticize the government as non-performing and insist that it was the Governor who was working to resolve the Mhadei issue and not the State government.
On Saturday, Malik said he had “kept myself aside” and that the government was discharging its responsibilities and will be successful.
The Governor made the comments to journalists when he was asked when the mining imbroglio in Goa would be resolved.
The State government is at loggerheads with the Karnataka government and also the Centre over the issue of the neighbouring State allegedly diverting the river’s waters illegally. A water dispute tribunal’s award has also been challenged before the Supreme Court by the Goa government on grounds that any diversion of water by Karnataka will spell doom for the ecology in Goa.
