Supreme Court ban on highway liquor outlets
PANAJI
Yesterday TCP Minister Vijai Sardessai and Leader of the Opposition Babu Kavlekar, former Chief Minister Digambar Kamat and Curtorim MLA Reginaldo Lourenco addressed separate press conferences to express their anger over the stringent rules laid down by the Supreme Court on liquor outlets along national and state highways, but it came three months too late.
What were all these MLAs doing between February 4, when the elections were held and 31 of March when the Supreme Court issued its order?
On Saturday Sardessai was all fire and brimstone. He told media persons that he along with his colleagues will meet Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar on Monday and push for an independent petition to be moved in the SC.
“There is a lot of commotion in the State after the SC order on liquor ban. Liquor is a part of Goan way of life and it is an integral element of our cultural and social ethos and therefore a fundamental ingredient of Goemkarponn”, he said adding, “We are with liquor traders and bar owners and are sympathetic towards them.”
Stating that Goans are responsible drinkers, he said, “We feel Goans are paying for somebody else’s irresponsibility. Tavern is a part of Goa’s culture. Goemkar is a responsible drinker and it has been proved. Statistics of Goa Police for five years show that less than one per cent of the deaths on highways are due to drunken driving.”
The question is, why did Sardessai wake up only after the Supreme Court delivered its verdict? What was he doing between March 14 when he was sworn in as minister and 31?
The first order of the court was delivered on 16 December 2016 but practically no politician or political party showed any interest in protecting the interest of liquor traders.
Sardessai sought to interpret the court order in a convenient way when he stated that, “The spirit of the SC judgment is already followed in Goa. So naturally we are exempted from it by virtue of law. So this has to be brought to the notice of the SC. What has the SC done with this new judgment? On the contrary, it is affecting livelihoods of so many people involved in the tourism trade. Secondly, it is affecting revenues of the State.”
Leader of the opposition, Chandrakant Babu Kavlekar blamed the government.
“They should have taken legal advice but they only make promises and do not deliver them. The same is the case with the stopping of the mining in the state. The Supreme Court order itself said that the state did not file a writ petition. Why did the state government not file the application when the court asked for it? We have lost a golden opportunity to have the ban lifted, but it is clear that the government is not interested,” said Kavlekar.
On whether the party itself would approach the court, Kavlekar said members were studying the issue and how they could legally address the issue.
Why was a similar effort not made before March 31. In fact, the court noted that no person had come forward to express a grievance which meant everyone was in favour of it.
Blaming the BJP-led government in the State for ‘not having no intention to fix the problem’, Margao MLA Digambar Kamat said that of the eight states that filed applications with the Supreme Court, three had Congress-run governments.
The former Chief Minister was of the opinion that Goa could have been exempted from the ban like the states of Sikkim, Meghalaya and Himachal Pradesh, had a writ petition to be filed.
“Goa could have got relief had the state emphasised on the need for exemption from the ban since we are a small state. They could have got relief simply from the fact that 30 to 40 percent of the land is forested, we have a huge coastline and two national highways passing through most of the villages that would mainly hurt the livelihood of the local populace,” he said.
According Reginaldo Lourenco, the party would lend support to locals who have been hit by the ban. “Several local vendors have threatened to take to the streets in protest. We have decided to join them if that is the case.
