PANAJI
The Goa government has uploaded high resolution images of the Outline Development Plans (ODPs) on the official website of the Town and Country Planning Department after prodding from the Goa Bachao Abhiyan and an activist José Marie Miranda which had filed a petition urging directions to the TCP, NGPDA etc to upload the ODPs on website.
When the matter came up for hearing the Advocate General initially told the court that high resolution images were already being uploaded.
However, lawyers representing the GBA pointed out that only the Kadamba ODP was of high resolution, whereas the other three were blurred.
“Without these copies, a significant section of Goans are severely restricted from participating in the planning process. It is very difficult to carry out and in depth study of the plans without having access to soft copies of the same as copies produced from photographs are not of the same scale and detail as the original,” the petitioners said.
The High Court then proceeded to grant the Goa government half an hour to verify and if necessary upload fresh high resolution plans.
The matter went back and forth until the matter was called out for a third time when GBA told the Court that they were satisfied with the resolution of the fresh plans uploaded by the Goa government.
