Byline: Karan Sehgal
As Laxmikant Parsekar completes one year in office as Goa's chief minister, The Goan Everyday spoke to key businesspersons of the state to understand how favourably they were impacted by his policies. Almost without exception, people said Parsekar has good intentions. But, they also added later that good intentions haven't materialised into much in the last twelve months that he has been the chief minister.
The situation on ground remains as bad for business people as it was a year ago. Taking approvals still takes a lot of time even when the state government has been saying that it has the investment promotion board (IPB) as a single window clearance system. Basic issues like lack of power and water is still plaguing industries in industrial estate and even outside.
Kirit Maganlal, founder of The Magsons Group, said, "We are relying on generators for power supply for almost 24 hours at our Magsons supermarket in Caculo Mall. This not only causes us great inconvenience but it even increases the power bill, which we obviously can't pass on to the consumer"
Magsons is the most popular supermarket of Panaji. Their high end equipments require 24 by 7 power supply and that too of very high quality. The state government is failing to provide regular power supply which puts a lot of pressure on such establishments.
Verna Industrial Estate continues to struggle with lack of adequate supply of water. The state government has initiated work on creating infrastructure but in an extremely haphazard manner. Damodar Kochkar, president of Verna Industrial Estate Association, said, “Tender was floated for pump-house, but no one came forward to show interest. That is because you can’t float a tender just for pump-house. Alongwith pump-house, the government should also float tender for control panel, transformer, as only one person should get the contract for all of these”
Industrialists, without exception, complained about Goa Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC). They said that it takes a lot of time to get land-related approvals from GIDC. GIDC continues to struggle with lack of right kind of manpower. Since, all industrial estates directly come under GIDC, it is the most important government agency for industrialists. Lack of manpower, therefore, doesn’t remain just GIDC’s problem as it becomes a problem for industries.
The competition for Goa is getting tougher. Sources also revealed that Punjab and Chattisgarh have actually implemented single-window-clearance-system. Goa started talking about it much earlier than other states but has done not much about it till now.
Industries are facing problem pretty much everytime they interact with the state government. Kochkar continued, “At our last annual general meeting in August this year, we had made a request for an exclusive police station at Verna Industrial Estate. The office premises have been identified through GIDC. But, till now, police force hasn’t been deployed exclusively there. Formal notification is also yet to come”
What should ideally take weeks or days ends up taking months and at times even years in Goa even under current administration. The BJP government in Goa came when business people were frustrated with inefficient government departments in the past. Manohar Parrikar earlier as chief minister and now Parsekar are praised by industrialists for their quick understanding of issues. They have even installed right people at several departments. For instance, industrialists were full of praise for GIDC’s chairman Ganesh Gaonkar. But, apart from few key people, the overall government machinery hasn’t shown much improvement, at least for business.
One by one, several industries have shown their displeasure with the current government. Information technology (IT) professionals have already complained about lack of government support. Real estate players are complaining that government increases taxes but doesn’t create infrastructure. Industrial estates continue to suffer from basic issues like poor power and water supply. With next state elections in early 2017, Parsekar has very little time at hands to turn around the machinery. The challenge is immense.
