MARGAO
Panchayat stakeholders and the civil society have cried foul over the time frame set by the State Election Commission for scrutiny of the draft delimitation of Panchayat wards and to make suggestions and objections.
Though the SEC has given seven days, Panchayat stakeholders maintained that the draft delimitation was sent to some of the panchayats in Salcete only on Friday. Given that Saturday and Sunday being holidays and the State is on a carnival celebration mode, the stakeholders have called for extension of time to facilitate the people to go through the draft and make suggestions, if any.
While the draft delimitation of wards plans were open for public scrutiny at the offices of the respective Electoral Registration Officers on Thursday, there was lukewarm response to the draft. The Goan understands that one of the ERO, who is handling the draft of 11 village panchayats, has received inquiries only for 13 individuals, an official attributed the poor response from the public to the draft delimitation either for want of awareness amongst the people or that the people have avoided travelling to the city to have a look at the draft.
Chinchinim deputy Sarpanch Valentino Barretto wondered whether the limited time frame will help get the desired response from the people at the ward level. He pointed out that the draft plan was sent to the Panchayat only on Friday noon, saying peopled need to be given sufficient time to make suggestions.
Goa Panchayat Raj Institution’s Convenor and former Curtorim deputy Sarpanch J Santan Rodrigues demanded extension of time for the people to scrutinize the draft delimitation plan. “If the SEC is interested in getting maximum participation in the process and to make the whole process transparent, the time needs to be extended by some more days”, Santan said.
He has appealed to the people to Curtorim to lodge their suggestions and objections to the draft since the draft has made many changes in the existing wards.
GOACAN Coordinator, Roland Martins has also expressed concern over the Public Notice issued by Goa State Election Commission regarding the Delimitation of Village Panchayat wards for ensuing General Elections to 186 Village Panchayats 2022.
He said though the time fixed for the general public is shown as 7 days ie. 24th February 2022 (Thursday) to 2nd March 2022, the Public Notice is published on Friday 25th February 2022 thereby cutting short the time available to six days. “As the draft delimitation proposals prepared by the EROs will be kept open in the Office of the respective ERO for public scrutiny, the Office of the Mamlatdars / Jt Mamlatdars are closed on a Sunday and in this case it is 27th February thereby cutting short the time available to five days.
In its letter, GOACAN has demanded that the time limit for this scrutiny by the general public be allowed for a period of 10 working days and that those wishing to make suggestions / modifications /corrections may then submit the same to the concerned ERO during the 10 day period.
