the goan I network
PANAJI
The newly notified Outline Development Plans for several PDA areas including the Greater Panaji and the Calangute-Candolim PDA should be scrapped as they have the same insidious character as the now scrapped Regional Plan 2011, which was rejected by the people, the Aam Aadmi Party has said.
Addressing the press conference AAP Goa Convener Elvis Gomes said that the present government’s plan was “payback time” to help achieve all the commitments they had made to the builders lobby back then, but could not be achieved because the plan was scrapped then.
“It is intended to meet those old commitments and also make quick schemes for enrichment by our ministers,” Gomes said calling upon the people of Goa to rise against PDAs and ensure that planning is given to the people through the panchayats and municipalities on the basis of ‘swaraj.’
He complimented the people in the villages of the San André and St Cruz constituencies who have risen up against the plans saying that it is a true form of democracy.
“It is now very clear why the 2021 plan is kept in abeyance. Currently, the RP 2001 is in use, where the whole of Goa sits on a small table and town planners tell you whether your land is in settlement or out using a plastic school ruler and a vague practice, where a slip of one millimetre could free up thousand square metres. This was earlier stopped with the reparation of the 2021 plan and is now being revived. As we all know, vagueness helps the corrupt. The ODP despite all claims has no scientific or constitutional basis and goes against all planning norms,” AAP’s Dean D’Cruz said.
“Introduced in the 70s, the PDAs and ODPs whose initial function is planning and development, such as creating housing schemes, marketplaces, road development, etc are now resigned to art colouring classes where sudden colour changes have been done both for and against people in an arbitrary manner,” D’Cruz said.
“RTIs have revealed that the changes from low to high FARs (built up areas) have no real justification with questionable site visits (sometimes 10 sites in half an hour) and are done in a completely random manner. Any sensible zoning in any plan is based on boundaries of roads, natural features like water bodies, etc and not individual plots. We have seen in areas that new roads have been proposed through fields and mangroves as well as forests, with the intent of opening out new areas for development at the behest of local MLAs, regardless of real and present dangers of global warming,” he said.
