Team Herald
VASCO: There has been widespread criticism over the government’s decisions to go ahead with the mega projects they have been opposing. Recently, Power and Environment Minister Nilesh Cabral said his government will go ahead and take these projects to their logical conclusion. Over the last few months local residents and students from across Goa have asked their elected representatives questions about Mollem and have recently started a campaign called ‘Cabral you’ve got mail’ urging him to release the White Paper on Electricity power consumption in the public domain.
Now, concerned group of Goans have criticised Cabral’s statements, given that it has come after their Sunday protest at the Chandor railway gate.
Captain Viriato Fernandes, the Co-Convenor of Goencho Aavaz said, “The people of Goa will fight it out to their last breath, and not allow the coalition government of BJP, Adani, Sterlite, Vedanta and Jindal to destroy our land, wildlife sanctuaries, environment, health and the future of our youth.”
Orville Dourado Rodrigues, founder member of Goencho Ekvott group and Chairman of VACAD added, “Cabral must stop acting like an agent of the corporate to satiate their greed at the cost of the health, livelihood and environment in the tiny state of Goa. Goans will never forget the great betrayal by one whom they considered as one of their own.”
Researchers and lawyers from the Amche Mollem Citizen group stated that they are intrigued by Cabral’s ‘logical conclusion’. They questioned why the projects’ public interest remains unexplained to citizens and the forest clearance proposals from the Ministry of Environment’s web portal have “mysteriously disappeared”.
They asked the government why they are in a great hurry to collaborate with Sterlite Power (a subsidiary of Vedanta), a business that will be selling electricity to the State of Goa, while using government-owned protected area land.
They pointed out that despite a majority of panch members in Mollem demanding for a gram sabha on October 4, 2020, it wasn’t held and a license was issued without the Panchayat Secretary’s signature, something that has been challenged in the court.
Advocate Karleen De Mello asked, "Why is a company like Goa Tamnar (an SPV of Sterlite power) getting a free-pass to Goa's natural heritage is a question that thousands of Goans have been asking the government. Apart from the utter lack of due process, why was police protection given to Sterlite Power as early as February, 2019 before this project was even approved?"
She added that the power of the people is greater than the people in power and ‘that will be the logical conclusion that the government will learn about’.
As it stands, citizens can approach the High Court for interim relief if work starts within the Sanctuary. The next hearing will take place on December 1, 2020 and the Central Empowered Committee of the Supreme Court has been petitioned.