Mining is Goa's enemy number one: GGRM

Ganv Ghor Rakhon Manch today demanded that both the legal as well illegal mines be closed down as mining constitutes Goa's number one enemy.

The sound of protesting women and men from various coastal fishing villages, forest villages and those villages badly affected by mining projects, rang through the air as they thronged the streets of Panjim today. The rally of over five hundred people gathered much attention, as tourists, pedestrians and those hurrying to offices, were stopped by protesting people...

The person of the Gaon Ghor Rakhon Manch(GGRM) read out in detail the memorandum submitted by the people... The Regional Plan 2011 was revoked and while none of it was ever implemented .... things in Goa have got worse after its revocation. Listing their complaints against the Government and state of affairs, GGRM highlighted that while on the one hand big decisions are being taken by the state on mega projects, there is a simultaneous disempowering of local panchayats and gram sabhas and processes leading to village development plans.

Some of the issues highlighted were frauds by the Goa Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC) in leasing out land for SEZs, a huge water crisis in villages affected by mining industries which have not only extracted water from the area but also polluted the catchment areas, and community lands being blatantly converted to private lands for construction for buildings and minings.

They demanded licenses for commercial constructions be stopped, gram sabhas be empowered and village development plans encouraged, the 128 environmental clearances to mining industries and 98 more recently be withdrawn, that the Goa mining and mineral policy be withdrawn and all mines - legal as well as illegal be closed in Goa as this industry is Goa's enemy number one.

For Pictures please click here.

Sayantoni Datta, SADED-CSDS, New Delhi