MAPUSA
Granting ad interim relief in a PIL on the Sirsaim hill-cutting issue, the High Court of Bombay at Goa on Tuesday granted stay in the hill cutting and quarrying operations in Sirsaim bringing smiles on the face of the petitioners of Goencho Avaaz on the first day of the New Year.
A special vacation bench of the High Court on Tuesday ordered staying quarrying operations and hill cutting in survey No 20/1 of Sirsaim pending final hearing of the petition.
The deputy collector has been directed to ensure stoppage of works undergoing at the site.
The matter will come up for hearing next on January 9.
The petitioners led by Viriato Fernandes and Swapnesh Sherlekar, co-conveners of Goencho Avaaz, said illegal quarry and hill-cutting operations were being carried out in the middle of a forest area in survey No 20/1 at Konxem, Sirsaim, without environment clearance, TCP permission, conversion sanad or forest clearance.
Further, the illegal operations were being carried out despite stop-work notice issued by the village panchayat, the petitioners stated.
“The area is declared NDZ as per the Regional Plan 2021 and as per TCP Act, no quarrying operations or any other activities are permitted in the said area. The area is entirely of forest nature with a perennial spring named ‘Konxem’ (also popularly known as mini Amboli) flowing adjacent to the hill-cutting site, barely about 50 metres away,” the petitioners declared.
The Chief Secretary, department of mines & Geology, TCP, forest department, GSPCB, Deputy Collector (DRO), Goat State Environmental Impact Assessment Authority, Sirsaim panchayat, land owner Anand Salgaokar and contractor Avinash Bhobe have been made respondents in the case.
It may be recalled after noticing quarrying/hill cutting activity in its jurisdiction, the Sirsaim panchayat on December 1, 2018, first wrote to a number of authorities including deputy collector and Deputy Town Planner, Mapusa, to look into the matter and stop the illegal hill-cutting activity.
Since the activity did not stop, on December 11, acting on a private complaint the panchayat, issued stop work notice to the contractor and directed him to produce relevant documents and valid permission.
On December 16, the villagers led by Swapnesh Sherlekar called the Flying Squad and stopped the work. But the hill cutting work was being carried out to construct a road in Survey No 19 belonging to Sirsaim comunidade, forcing the panchayat to issue stop work notice to comunidade on December 20.
Reacting to the notice, the Sirsaim comunidade said it did not issue permission to anyone and objecting to the activities, requested strong action against the violators.
However, the deputy collector withdrew the stop work order on grounds that the owner was granted renewal of mining lease by the DMG on September 10 and the hill-cutting activity resumed on Dec 24.
