MARGAO
Town and Country Planning (TCP) Minister Vishwajit Rane’s plans to scrap Regional Plan 21 figured prominently at the gram sabha of the Loutolim panchayat on Sunday.
At the gram sabha meeting chaired by sarpanch Joana Fernandes, gram sabha member Xavier Fernandes opposed any move by the government to scrap the Regional Plan, saying such a move will only cause confusion and destruction of the environment. He feared that in the absence of a regional plan, industries will come into residential areas and the water bodies and fields will be destroyed in the name of development.
Another gram sabha member, however, pointed out that errors and discrepancies in the RP need to be corrected to mete out justice to the people. He said many people are being forced to knock on the doors of the courts to revert the change in zones. The gram sabha member demanded that no conversion should be allowed unless the TCP officials along with the panchayat physically inspected the sites before accepting the files.
After much discussion, the gram sabha decided that every village should have a regional plan to guide the development of the village. The resolution, however, stated that all errors in the RP should be corrected to give justice to the people whose settlement zones have been arbitrarily changed to orchards.
The meeting also discussed the issue of reassessment of trade tax and how to get the industrial and business houses under the tax net. The Panchayat secretary informed that the trade tax has not been revised and reassessed for the last several years. He said a panel was set up by the panchayat to conduct a survey on the number and industrial house and dockyards operating in the village and to impose the house and trade tax.
