the goan I network
MAPUSA
The Mapusa civic body went out of its way and hot-mixed all internal roads of eleven gated private colonies in the city even as roads in the North Goa District Hospital, Fire Brigade complex and several other public roads in the city have been crying for attention.
All roads in eleven colonies“ Garden Centre (ward 10), Chandranath Apartment (ward 10), Saldanha Apartment (ward 10), Near Kamat Palace (ward 13), Tara Garden (ward 14), Atmaram Enclave (ward 14), Gangadhar Apartment (ward 16), Parrikar Residency (ward 16), Caetan Paul Residency (ward 18), St Sebastian Apartment (ward 18) and Prabhu Garden (ward 18) “ have recently got a fresh carpet of hot-mix.
The civic body has used funds from the 14th Finance Commission to carry out the hot-mixing work.
Residents occupying these apartments can drive in their vehicles on the spanking new roads almost gifted by the civic body.
Correspondingly, roads in the North Goa District Hospital (Asilo) used by hundreds of people on a daily basis and roads in the complex occupied by the Mapsua Fire Brigade has been lying in pitiable condition for years.
Similarly, conditions of several roads at Carrasvaddo, Duler junction, Gaunsavaddo etc which are in a miserable condition have been ignored.
Sources in the know informed that gated colonies are private properties and the civic body was wrong in wasting public money on colony roads.
“How can Mapusa Municipal Council hot-mix private roads? Will the council hot-mix a road in my property?” asked Adv Mahesh Rane of Mapusa.
He further said that by hot-mixing the colony roads MMC was clearly indulging in vote bank politics.
Former chairperson, Adv Subhash Narvekar opined that actually the council cannot take up work in private properties.
He said some years back there was a dispute among two societies over hot-mixing of roads and later the society was directed to reimburse the amount to the council.
“Technically, the roads hot-mixed by MMC becomes public roads and therefore anyone can park their vehicles inside the colony or even use it as public access,” Narvekar said.
Seconding him was another former chairperson, Michael Carrasco who said that if the colony surrenders the roads to MMC then they no longer become private roads.
“Such colonies cannot put a gate and they have to allow outside vehicles to park inside the compound,” Carrasco said.
Sources informed the Director of Municipal Administration had directed the council to obtain NOCs from the societies and then carry out hot-mixing of the roads.
Sources further informed that most of the societies have given a go-ahead to the MMC to hot-mix the roads.
The Mapusa Municipal Council, Municipal Engineer, Diniz De Melo informed that the council had carried out the task of hot-mixing by following all procedures.
“The council has taken a resolution to hot-mix all the colony roads. Such works have been done in several other municipalities too,” De Melo disclosed.
According to Adv Mahesh Rane even if the council has taken an approval for the job, it was illegal.
“Many times they (MMC) go scot free only because nobody questions or challenges them,” he said.
