VASCO
Goencho Ekvott (GE) is likely to canvass in all the 40 constituencies of Goa to ensure that BJP candidates are defeated while claiming that the BJP party is working against the interests of Goa and its people.
Addressing the media in Vasco, GE said that it was shocked to learn that the Goa Cabinet has recently granted approval for the acquisition of additional land at Guirdolim and Sanguem for double-tracking despite stiff opposition from locals.
“GE is protesting against this undemocratic decision of the government, and hence its members retaliated by beating the effigy of the Chief Minister of Goa Pramod Sawant with slippers. This CM has overlooked the Goan sentiments and Goan demography of the place by merely working as an agent for the crony capitalists of Gujarat. Despite the gram sabha resolutions of more than 70 per cent of the panchayats and opposition, its own BJP MLA who vociferously opposed the project, this Government is ruining our lives, livelihood and environment to promote the BJP agenda of development which is solely to help the coal mafia,” said the GE press note
GE Joint Secretary of Olencio Simoes said that in May 2020, 60,117 sq metres of land was fraudulently acquired in Majorda and on 15th July 2021 more land of 8,104 sq metres was to be acquired for the special project of double-tracking and now this additional land for doubling from Kulem to Margao section of South Western railways in Guirdolim and Sanguem.
“Goa government is all out to destroy our heritage houses and UNESCO recognised world heritage site at Mollem which is one of the eight hotspots of biodiversity in the world despite resolutions by Panchayats and 90 per cent of landowners objecting to the acquisition of ancestral land for double-tracking and the NH4A expansion. The state government has made it crystal clear to make Goa as a coal corridor to industrial steel plants in Maharashtra and Karnataka through road, rail, inland and coastal waterways, sad the GE press note further.
GE founder member, Orville Dourado Rodrigues, questioned why the CM was so anti-Goan especially when the SC directed the Central Empowered Committee to conduct on-site inspection. The CEC evaluated and submitted to the court its recommendation that it ‘does not find any justification for undertaking a project of this nature.
