the goan I network
PANAJI
The Bombay High Court at Goa has dismissed a petition filed by a group of Parra farmers who had approached the Bombay High Court at Goa challenging a decision of the District Magistrate to allow the setting up of power lines in the fields of Verla and Parra.
The farmers have been fighting this battle since the beginning of the year, objecting to the electricity department’s plans to erect 33 KV electrical transmission lines through the petitioners’ private agricultural lands and fields without any permissions.
In February this year, the High Court had directed the farmers to approach the District Magistrate and directed the them to take an appropriate decision promptly. However on June 4, the Magistrate passed an order overruling the objections of the farmers contending that their objections had no merits.
“It is clear that the proposal of the electricity department for the alignment of new line along with the existing 33KV line is found to be the best available route and hence it has been selected by the Electricity Department,” District Magistrate Vikas Gaunekar said in his order.
The villagers had raised a grievance that electric lines are laid by raising poles in their fields contrary to the provisions of law and that no consent was obtained whilst laying or placing electric supply lines on or over their lands. They told the court that, if the electrical lines are allowed to be placed through their fields as proposed, they would be deprived of their right to livelihood as the lands would no longer be cultivable in addition to being unsafe.
With this order, the electricity department can now go ahead and erect the electricity poles in the fields to take up 33 KV power line, which will supply power to a electricity-starved Calangute and Candolim.
The Parra villagers had also vented their ire against local MLA Michael Lobo, who they said was mainly responsible and working hard to bring the 33 KV line through their fields.
Expressing happiness over the High Court order, Lobo said public utility services should not be stopped by anyone. “This power line was the need of the hour.”
