Goa's CM Pramod Sawant launched the Goa Amritkal Agriculture Policy to preserve agricultural land, banning its conversion for non-agricultural use. I have heard numerous announcements from CM about preserving Goa’s prized land/environment including: Talathi to be responsible to check/prevent hill cutting; all files for mega projects will have to come to CM for approval; action against hill cutting and environmental violations by DLF, Bhutani; action on Zuari land scam where land acquired at very low rates now being sold at huge premium by the real estate lobby; on huge areas being sold as farm houses. We can see that despite all these “words of assurance/action” by CM , nothing actually has been done and situation is getting from bad to worse. So is it really confirmed that no agricultural land will be converted or will there be loopholes or illegal works to convert (where Goa Govt will look the other way)? There is enough evidence in Goa be it the illegal rail work at Velsao, sound pollution at Anjuna/Vagator, ore transportation at Pilgao, various hill cutting/land filling cases showing that the government has scant respect for the law.
