Recently, there was a 64-year-old woman residing in Naikawado in Calangute, who was killed in her house over a monetary dispute related to a property sale by two brokers. They apparently killed her because they had entered into a deal with her to sell her property, but she found some other broker and executed the deal. This enraged the two brokers, and killed her.
Of course the killing itself is sad. Every life is extremely important. But we are looking at the larger issue of increasing violence in Goa, probably resembling the situation once prevailed in Mumbai, where the property conflicts at one point of time were riddled with bullets and the underworld.
Now, obviously one cannot say that the entire ecosystem of property deals and brokers has these kinds of people. In all likelihood, this may be a very small percentage, maybe a very minuscule portion of people who are illegal, having the mafia mentality and working on behalf of somebody to get a property deal done by hook or crook.
But the point here is that these black sheep as it were, while they’re increasing in number, yet very minuscule, are ultimately becoming a reference point to painting the entire ecosystem of people, who play a big part in getting property deals done. Ultimately, what happens is one death like this leads to a greater negative impression.
Maybe a lot of propety deals are being executed where the transactions are clear. Now, with more and more properties being sold in Goa, you have land laws which are getting more and more conducive towards construction in many ways, we have so many cases of land conversions, hill cutting and all that, which is of course another subject altogether. But it’s sufficient to say that in Bardez alone, in one month registers about roughly 36,000 property sales a year.
If you look at say even five talukas viz. Bardez, Tiswadi, Salcete, Mormugao and even Pernem, ultimately you have about 1,80,000 property sales a year. Now we do not know how much of this is completely legal and in how many cases there would be some amount of violence used, some amount of muscle flexing.
We will not know places where people have been evicted, either legally or illegally. Of course, all evictions are not legal, but the idea here is to highlight the overall decay of Goa, as we see.
We’ll just say one thing, in the sense that let us look at the violence and criminalisation of property dealings, not just as a simple property related problem.
It is a part of overall Goa’s ecosystem, where muscle flexing and power flexing have increasingly become the rule, rather than the exception. Of course whatever has been stated till now is absolutely debatable, but this is the premise on which we are discussing the issue with various stakeholders.
Speaking on the overall ecosystem of getting into this whole area of criminalisation, even if it’s small, and whether it is a worrying trend, Dr Jagannath (Desh) Prabhudesai, Chairman, CREDAI, said, “There are two aspects by which we have to look into this real estate growth in Goa. Post-Covid, the real-estate sector has grown rapidly. Particularly what we have seen, because I have been doing some projects mostly in the southern side of Goa, but on the northern side, what we have seen is that it is just growing. We at CREDAI sometimes just sit over and think what is going on.”
“Basically what we have noticed is there are small plots and sellers are trying to target non-Goans, particularly from Delhi and sell them the units at a higher price, which has created the need for land. It may be a 300, 400, 500 or a 1,000 square metre land and the prices have just shot up,” Prabhudesai said.
“Like, particularly a few years back, a place called Assagao, where we never thought of buying a plot even at the rate of Rs 10,000-12,000 per square metre area, which is what I have heard, has gone for more than a lakh per square meter. This is worrying,” he said.
“Basically, people like us who are in the construction line, particularly look for clear title plots. What we have been noticing, because I also tried to have some land dealings in North Goa, I was warned that there’s a big question mark about land titles, which is a worrying thing, because there may be some land whose owners are abroad and are not traceable. Such conditions require title search, so that the title is derived properly. It is essential to know whom the land belonged to earlier and who owns it now. This is a worrying point,” the Chairman of Goa CREDAI said.
“Now what the issue is, we cannot call these so-called brokers related to the real estate sector. They are just people who think of grabbing money and they’re not going through a proper route. Because if he’s a broker, then he has to register himself properly and then do the dealings, otherwise the deals do not happen,” he said.
“The brokers in this case just wanted to make money out of a small deal somewhere, which they failed and this fiasco happened. But it is an alarming thing for us and I think we all at Goa have to worry about such things. We should not encourage or we should see that such things do not take place, since it is dangerous for the real estate industry,” Prabhudesai said.
Advocate Shashank Narvekar, was in the forefront demanding justice for fellow lawyer Adv Gajanand Sawant, who was brutally assaulted over a property dispute, said, “It was a completely out and out property dispute. Apparently it belonged to a cop and he was brutally thrashed by cops in civil clothes.
What is important here is there was a preliminary inquiry into that incident. We do not know the status of it. There was a magisterial inquiry ordered by the then Collector, Mamu Hage. Then there was a retired high court judge, Justice R M S Khandeparkar, who was supposed to monitor the investigations.
Without getting into the details of the investigation, it is suffice to say that nothing has come out of it so far. In December, the incident will be completing in two years. The larger question that we are all flagging is, this whole criminalisation that has gone into the property deals, which we never saw in Goa earlier.
Now it almost seems that it has become like a mini Mumbai property deal scenario, where the mafia was closely connected to real estate.
Reacting to all these developments, Adv Narvekar said, “I look at it from a different perspective. The boom in Goa’s real estate sector and increase in the rates of the land have happened over the last 10 to 12 years or so. During these years, we’ve also seen a sort of breakdown of the financial status of people, where they have gone below the poverty line. A lot of data is inflated to show that we are doing very well economically. But that's not the case.”
“What has happened now, if you go to every house today in Goa, at least a couple of people will say that he is doing land deals. We have to understand why that is happening and why people are attracted to this field of work. There are WhatsApp groups of these brokers, on which they put out the details of property dealing. Let’s say a property is on sale for Rs 10,000-15,000 per square foot. By the time it reaches a customer, the cost cited is Rs 50,000-60,000 because everybody wants a piece of the pie. The reason for this is these brokers want to make money out of nowhere because there’s no financial stability for any family today,” Adv Narvekar said.
“There are no jobs, there is absence of other avenues where people can work. The businesses are shutting down. There are a lot of barriers in the way of setting up your own businesses. All these things drive people to make a quick buck, because they’ve been out of work, not having any sort of financial stability for five to 10 years. Not being able to sustain a family for so long will drive you to finding a quick source of income,” he said.
“Now this is basically with one deal. If 10 people are making profit, that is the best place to go and make quick money,” he said.
If you are earning the money legally, then there is no problem. The worrying factor is the criminalisation of real estate sector, which is happening primarily because one of the reasons could be that with the demand for real estate and projects being so much and land being finite, obviously you are getting more and more into land deals through various means to get into construction in areas, which were earlier not meant for construction.
This means the total ticket size has gone up, which means there will be areas when there will be people living in that property, either as tenants for a long time without papers or they could be people who have been there for a long time and who don’t want to sell but you want to buy by hook or crook.
Now that brings in another class of people, who are not brokers, but who are whose main job is to vacate the land of all encumbrances, which are no longer brick and mortar. They have become humans.
Throwing light on this issue, Adv Narvekar said, “Couple of months ago, we had one incident in Assagao, where a house was demolished, then the people didn't know who demolished it. There was a lot of hue and cry (Pooja Sharma case). Then in the end, it came to a situation where the person who was crying about it, only is not out and about, seeking their own relief.”
“Similarly, in this case, something is promised, the person doesn’t get it and they resort to the worst possible scenario, where now somebody is dead. The issue is that land will always be finite, but greed is not. People keep wanting more and that is the reason why now we cannot keep up with the demand,” he said.
“As a lawyer, I am also dealing with a lot of real estate transactions as I also do a lot of conveyancing. The demand for a property when we put it out for sale through public notices, is ridiculous. The type of competition that is there between the real estate companies, between the brokers is unprecedented. I don’t know whether it’s a mirage that has been created outside Goa, that there is so much property available in Goa that you can definitely come and purchase anything here,” he said.
Adv Narvekar further added that everybody seems to be for sale. “Even the owners seem to be for sale, the brokers seem to be for sale and everyone is ready to buy a piece, which is systemically a problem with the society. It’s got nothing to do with the real estate sector per se. But nobody is facilitating a legal process to do the transactions correctly. To facilitate that, all these processes should be done properly.”
Speaking on the blatant criminalisation of property business, Roshan Mathias, Director, Mog Foundation, said, “I welcome wholeheartedly what my colleague Adv Shashank has just spoken. He hit the nail on the head actually. Criminalisation and corruption are just offshoots of the actual problem, which is the deteriorating socio-economic condition of our society. Today our families have become so poor that any kind of income for the house is welcome. Legal income is not possible as Shashank rightly pointed out, businesses are not allowed for locals. For example, today I was just passing through Panjim and a thought occurred to me, if I want to put a small gado in Panjim on the river bank, would I be allowed as a Goan to do that? Definitely not. But we have the casinos earning crores of rupees daily.”
“So where am I in this? So should I simply cry about this at home or should I also try and earn something? Where do I earn from? So if you look at the crime trends, you will find that Goans are gullible and there is no father or mother who is there to protect us. The father and mother about whom I have always spoken in all debates, is our government, our political representatives, where are they today? Have any of them spoken about the murder in Calangute? Where is the local MLA of Calangute?” asked Mathias.
“The same MLA, who raised voice three days after the Pooja Sharma case, was not there when the Naik case happened in Candolim. In fact, he offered the Candolim family to sell the property to a Delhi builder. There again was the same case, where the local family, who actually owned that place, which even had a heritage value, so much so that the entire street has been named after their grandfather Gajanan Naik. He was one of the sarpanchas of Candolim and you are telling that family to leave this place and give it to somebody else. Today, bouncers of the builder are in the house, occupying the rooms,” Mathais said.
“A whole lot of people who are interested in making money in Goa. We are saying that those brokers who took brokerage, don’t have family business. What about these people who have businesses and are trying to take over the land of Goa. This is happening just because we are gullible,” he said.
The point is brokers play an important part in property transactions because very often they get the buyer and seller together and ensure that all legalities are done seamlessly.
But what about the black sheep and the sharks who are getting in and creating problems? How does this all work? How can it be done legally and who are the illegal elements in the brokerage business?
Responding to the questions, Vishal Bhamare, Co-Founder of Propertyhub, a real estate broker firm, said, “We do property dealing with a person who is willing to transact. That is when their will is there, not forced. All these issues which have been flagged, do concern us. It not only spoils the market’s reputation, but also adversely affects our position. So, yes. It is a concern for us and it is worrying the way these things are happening around Goa.”
“So, especially after the Calangute incident, I feel people should be more vigilant while selling their property. No doubt the prices of the properties in Goa have increased substantially in the last five to 10 years. So people need to be alert regarding whom they are appointing to sell their property,” Bhamare said.
Goa for a very long time was never a centre of greed. People earned out of tourism and the tourism business fed a lot of families. To be honest, tourism is going absolutely downhill in the sense that the charm of laidback tourism, which gave enjoyment to all, employment to all, is going because a new spectre of tourism or a new template is coming into being.
Secondly, mining, which of course benefited a few families, but also at the same time gave employment to a large number of people in the mining belt, was also a major source of income. Of course, there was a lot of illegal mining, which led to its stoppage. But the fact remains that extracting wealth out of minerals is something which is no longer a business in Goa as it was once upon a time.
So, obviously that leaves real estate as the new opportunity on the block and from a situation where real estate was need-based, it has completely become greed-based and it has also become that big pie, with everybody putting their hands in it and slowly you have different hands coming in, completely knowing at that one can extract as much as one wants, out of the land itself. So at this point of time, the ratio between demand and supply has become absolutely skewed. The idea is that people are building for the sake of building. People are entering into land which is not available but making that available. Large number of projects are happening not because Goa needs more housing, but because people from all over the country need more houses as a second or third home or purely as an investment.
So, Goa has actually become that prized piece of land, which can be used for any amount of extraction to fulfill the greed and this itself is leading to an entire ecosystem of crime, bad politics, so on and so forth, which ultimately is completely burying the real person, who is affected the most, which is the local Goan.
Apart from their culture, traditions and livelihoods getting completely demolished, the land which is synonymous with their existence and with their ancestry, even that is getting completely out of bounds for them and literally being extracted from them by hook or crook and often by absolute force. People are paying for this even with their lives and that is our biggest concern that ultimately what kind of Goa are we left with?