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PANAJI: In the wake of the recent Supreme Court order questioning the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) study of the project, the Mopa Airport-Affected Farmers' committee (MAAFC) on Monday demanded that the project be scrapped and the acquired land be reverted back to them.
The farmers also demanded that the Tillari project command area water be made available on the plateau by continuing the pipeline project which was started in view of the upcoming airport.
“The Supreme Court order supports our stand that land acquisition done for the airport is totally illegal. Not even a single farmer has taken compensation amount. The entire process of acquisition and the project is a land scam,” said Sandeep Kambli of MAAFC while addressing a dharna at Azad Maidan, Panaji.
“The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) report stated that wild animals, plants, springs are not there when there are 36 springs in the area. The forest department granted permission to cut 21,700 trees at the project site which contradicts the EIA report which states that there are no plants in the area,” said Kambli, adding that the EIA report is completely false.
At the public hearing, people of the area submitted that there are bisons and deers in the area. Said Kambli, "There are leopards in the area. The plateau is not barren land as the grass from the area was taken as cattle feed even by people from nearby areas of Maharashtra."
"The EIA public hearing was conducted as a mere formality and all the critical views of the people were overlooked," Kambli alleged.
The Supreme court has suspended the Environmental Clearance (EC) granted to the project and asked the Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC) of the Minister of Environment, Forests and Climate Change to revisit the process of assessing the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) to grant clearance and report back in one month.
Kambli questioned how the land acquisition process was completed first and Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) report done afterwards.
He also alleged that the airport's work tender was allotted to GMR before the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and land acquisition procedure was complete.
