* Exercise to seal 67 tourism establishments begins in coastal village, process to continue today * Aggrieved tourism operators to meet CM today * Morcha at Canacona Dy Collectorate planned on Monday
A structure being sealed at Agonda village on Thursday.
Photo Credits: Bernard Fernandes
CANACONA
The famed Agonda beach witnessed a flurry of activity on Thursday, as authorities began the process of sealing 67 tourism establishments on orders of the high court.
Officials sealed 27 tourism structures and some of them were partially dismantled by their owners, while the drive to seal the remaining structures will continue on Friday.
Incidentally, all 27 structures sealed on Thursday had been set up in private properties.
Canacona Dy Collector Madhu Narvekar, Mamlatdar Manoj Korgaonkar, BDO Savio Coutinho and GCZMA officials began the process of sealing the structures at about 1.30 pm on the southern side of Agonda beach amid tight police security.
Officials went to each of the earmarked structure and sealed the premises with a lock and a notice stating that the structure was being sealed following an order passed by the high court and an order issued by the Canacona Deputy Collector and Sub Division Officer.
By around 5.45 pm, 27 structures/establishments were sealed by authorities after allowing the operators to remove their stocks or allowing the owners to dismantle/demolish their structures on their own.
Many shops, including liquor shops, ice-cream parlours, salons and travel agencies, were allowed to take out their stocks and valuables, before teams comprising the Panchayat secretaries Amol K Naikgaunkar, Sushant Lolienkar under the nodal officer and Canacona BDO Savio Coutinho, applied locks and completed the sealing process.
A team of electricity officials disconnected the power supply and cut-off electricity connection to the meter boxes of all the 27 sealed establishments.
An engineer from GCZMA was present to identify the 67 structures, establishments, which also included resorts having shacks and huts, kiosks, Kashmiri stalls, etc. after the high court ordered the deputy collector to halt within 24 hours the operations of those 67 establishments at the beach.
A strong police force were also present, while locals and tourists turned up to witness the drive to seal the structures.
ANGER, ACTION PLAN
Many aggrieved owners of the 27 structures accused the attorney general of not defending the tourism stakeholders in the high court and instead, siding with the petitioner who had demanding action against them.
They claimed that their structures were nowhere close to the protected turtle nesting site at Agonda, which was reportedly cited as the reason for the sealing of their structures.
“The turtle nesting is on the northern-side of Agonda beach, while all 67 structures taken up for sealing are hundreds of metres toward the south of the beach and away from the turtle nesting site. Our structures are nowhere connected to any disturbance or infringement of the turtle nests,” informed an angry operator.
"We are going to meet Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Friday and lodge a strong complaint against the Attorney General for not protecting the people in the court.”
Some aggrieved stakeholders also blamed Speaker and local MLA Ramesh Tawadkar for not coming to the assistance of the affected people.
“Recently, 17 structures were also sealed or removed, but our MLA did not visit the site even once. Now, 67 more structures are ordered for a shutdown and still, our MLA is nowhere to be seen or heard,” said another tourism operator.
“We have now requested our MLA to fix an appointment with Chief Minister Pramod Sawant during his visit to Canacona on Friday, in order to resolve this situation. We will present the ground reality and express our grievances before the chief minister, and to seek his intervention to save our livelihood.”
The aggrieved tourism stakeholders have also decided to stage a morcha at the Canacona Dy Collectorate on Monday, to criticise the action by authorities on the tourism operators.
“If today our establishments are closed/shutdown in view of the turtle protection site, tomorrow it will be rest of the tourism structures on the entire beach coast and we appeal to sought all villagers should join in the morcha on Monday,” appealed a tourism operator.
In a case before the high court, the petitioner had argued that the area had been declared a No Development Zone while raising concerns about the impact of illegal constructions. The petition mentioned that 82,000 square metres of beach stretch in question was designated as a turtle nesting site with Agonda Beach having zero carrying capacity.
