MARGAO
Margao Municipal Council’s lengthy agenda for the upcoming ordinary meeting scheduled on Thursday should not come as a surprise.
The council seems to have rushed with a host of issues, making the agenda of tomorrow’s meeting a lengthy one, with many in the corridors of the municipality saying it probably is the last meeting before the five-year term of the current body ends in the first week of November.
Around 33 items are listed on the agenda of the ordinary meeting scheduled to start at 3 pm on Thursday. The focus of attention, however, is on the contentious issue of the bio-methanation plants which has generated a controversy of sorts over their costing.
That the issue of the plants will come up before the council for deliberations is evident from the fact that the MMC Standing Committee has given a thumbs up for the seven bio-methanation plants estimated to cost the civic body Rs 42-odd crore, with a condition that the proposal is placed before the council meeting on Thursday.
While each of the bio-methanation plants proposed to be deliberated by the council is expected to cost around Rs 4.80 crore, administrative approvals already sanctioned by the government to set up three bio-methanation plants at the PDA market will cost the civic body less than Rs 10 crore.
While the ruling Goa Forward-backed group is expected to support the latest proposal to set up the seven bio-methanation plants costing Rs 42-odd crore, all eyes are focused on the opposing Congress and BJP group of councillors, whether they would support the first proposal, where the government has already granted administrative approval or the latest proposal awaiting government’s administrative approval.
The meeting is also expected to deliberate on a host of other contentious issues, including the proposal from the traffic police to start pay parking in the city. The pay parking proposal was scrapped around 20 years ago when the BJP-backed council had introduced the same in the city following strong protests from the Youth Congress then headed by incumbent GPCC Chief Girish Chodankar.
City Fathers in private say that instead of giving sanction for the pay parking on the roads, the council should expedite early completion of the multi-level parking project proposed on the municipal land five years ago.
The council is also expected to deliberate on the payment of Rs one crore fine to Goa Pollution Control Board for the damage caused to the environment by the Sonsodo fire two years ago. The MMC legal counsel has requested the civic body to discuss whether to move the High Court with a writ petition.
