PANAJI
Poriem MLA Deviya Rane on Tuesday urged the government to declare the ‘Ghodemodni’ festival at Thane-Sattari as a ‘State Festival’ to boost its push to promote hinterland tourism.
Deviya said it is over a century-old tradition and is very elaborately organised by locals there and incurs an expenditure of approximately Rs 15 lakh. “If you make it a State festival they will get some financial support and it can also be promoted to boost hinterland tourism,” Deviya said.
Deviya was speaking in the Goa legislative assembly during the discussion on the demands for grants pertaining to tourism, Information Technology and the Printing and Stationery departments.
Deviya also urged the government to make efforts for international destination connectivity at the two airports. “If we are to increase international arrivals we need more direct flights to the State from multiple countries. The government should take the initiative. If Singapore Airlines can fly directly to Sri Lanka, there is no reason they cannot come to Goa,” Deviya said.
Deviya meanwhile expressed satisfaction that the IT department has provided WiFi Hotspots across key areas in her Poriem constituency, including Ajoba locality, Keri panchayat, Bhoomika locality, and Honda panchayat.
Several other MLAs from the treasury benches raised issues specific to their own constituencies related to tourism. For instance, Cumbharjua MLA, Rajesh Phaldesai, raised the issue of the need for streamlining the flow of tourists into Old Goa where they flock to the UNESCO world heritage sites.
He also asked for greater government support for the Bonderam festival at Divar.
Saligao MLA, Kedar Naik raised the issue of a non-functional water fountain at the Saligao traffic-island circle, a crucial junction en-route to the beach belt of Candolim, Calangute, Baga and further up North.
On the other side of the aisle, Opposition MLAs too raised constituency-specific issues but were also critical of the functioning of the Tourism department.
Fatorda MLA, Vijai Sardesai for instance raised the issue of “low budget, cheap tourists” swarming Goa and creating nuisance. He also raised the issue of wasteful expenditure on foreign junkets by tourism officials ostensibly to promote Goa as a destination in those countries.
Sardesai said there were trips being made to some remote areas of Russia and took to sarcasm to question whether the officials had genuinely gone to promote tourism or to set up a mining operation there.
Taking pot-shots at Tourism Minister Rohan Khaunte, Sardesai again took to sarcasm to suggest that the Tourism Portfolio be bifurcated into Tourism (Goa) and Tourism (Porvorim).
