the goan I network
PANAJI
The proposal to set up an International Convention Centre, needed for IFFI, on prime Dona Paula land which once might have been the venue of an ambitious but failed ‘IT Habitat’ project could pose an acid test of character for the fledgling career at the helm of the State’s affairs for Chief Minister Pramod Sawant.
Sawant had on Thursday last, chaired a meeting of the ‘Empowered Committee’ formed with IT Minister Jennifer Monserrate, EDC chairman Sadanand Tanavde, the IT Secretary to the government, the IT Director and the Director of Information and Publicity.
The meeting decided to implement the project under the aegis of the Information Department, instead of the EDC.
The proposal to set up the Convention Centre in its current form has its genesis in a September 2017 decision of the cabinet of the late Manohar Parrikar, wherein the proposal to construct the Convention Centre at the Taleigao Plateau site was approved. But Economic Development Corporation (EDC), according to the cabinet decision, was to be the special purpose vehicle (SPV) through which the project was to be executed. Now, the meeting chaired by Sawant on Thursday modified the proposal and it will be the Department of Information and Publicity, which is the nodal department for IFFI, and not the EDC, which will execute the Convention Centre.
The tweak, in a way, resolves a serious objection raised by officials of the State Finance Ministry over the EDC-promoted plan, which had proposed signing the deal over the nearly 2-lakh square meters of prime land, currently owned by the State IT department, with the selected Concessionaire in the name of ‘officials’ of the EDC.
The finance ministry had objected to this move and advised that the State’s interest in the prime land worth over Rs 2000 crore would be in peril if the deal is signed on behalf of the State government by an official of the EDC.
“The deal must be signed in the name of the Governor of Goa,” the Finance Ministry had advised the chief minister’s office in a formal note.
Sawant told The Goan that he hasn’t applied his mind
to the finer details of several queries raised over the Convention Centre project by the Finance department, a portfolio which he himself holds.
He however, assured that every issue raised by the department will be addressed before any final decision is taken on what route the entire process will take before it is sought to be executed.
The Finance department has also questioned the proposal to grant to the concessionaire who wins the bid for the project, the leasehold rights on the 2-lakh square meters. “Grant of leasehold rights may lead to demise of the site unto the Concessionaire in perpetuity” the Finance department had pointed out in its note, while cautioning that the Concessionaire will be free to create mortgage on the site, jeopardizing the State/Government’s ownership interests permanently.
Sawant said, the query raised by the Finance Department was valid and that his government will find a way out to address it and protect the interest of the State.
Meanwhile, at Thursday’s meeting of the Empowered Committee, another significant decision taken was to initiate the process of transferring the land from the ownership of the IT Department to the Department of Information and Publicity.
Currently, EDC which was handling the project on behalf of the Goa government, is working on handing over the task to the Information Department, including handing over the two-lakh square meters of land at the Taleigao plateau.
Over a decade ago, the land was earmarked for an IT Habitat -- Rajiv Gandhi IT Habitat -- which was then billed as a project which would propel Goa as an important IT hub of the country. It was inaugurated by the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi.
But in the months following the grandiose inaugural, the project got dogged by a raging controversy with the then Digambar Kamat-led governmnet and the then IT Minister Dayanand Narvekar accused of perpetrating a land scam by allocating spaces to real estate companies rather than the IT companies who had evinced keen interest to invest there.
The project got shelved and the controversy snowballed with Kamat sacking Narvekar from the cabinet.
The IT habitat proposal then got an unceremonious but permanent burial when the late Parrikar took over the State’s reigns post the 2012 Assembly elections but the site found a new utility with the proposal to set up the long needed International Convention Centre which would double up as the permanent venue for the IFFI.
Now Sawant, only in his seventh month as Chief Minister, faces an uphill task of executing the plan, a challenge that could either buttress his image as an astute leader or deal his political persona a body blow, depending on how well and soon the execution of the Convention Centre project kick starts.
