PANAJI
Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Tuesday admitted that much of the current flooding and other rain-related incidents are due to the enhanced scale of development in the State and man-made.
"When we speak of the ongoing flooding and disaster management, a lot of the incidents can be said to be man-made. Traditional drains and ways (vatto) for the storm water to flow have been blocked with dumping of mud," Sawant said in the Goa legislative Assembly.
He was responding to the discussion on the calling attention motion moved by three legislators from the treasury benches -- Deviya Rane, Chandrakant Shetye and Jit Arolkar -- raising concerns over the flooding/inundation, landslides and water-logging due to the ongoing spell of incessant rains.
Sawant also blamed local bodies -- municipalities and panchayats -- for doing very little for the upkeep of the traditional drains and nullahs.
"Every panchayat has been disbursed Rs 50,000 each only for the purpose of cleaning up the drains and nullahs before the monsoon. Many have kept this money in fixed deposits and are earning interest," Sawant said.
The chief minister also found fault in excessive concretisation of drains and gutters pointing out that building concrete drains was detrimental to recharge of groundwater.
Sawant, who as chief minister also chairs the State Disaster Management Authority, also said that much work had been done by the SDMA over the last couple of years in terms of acquiring modern equipment to tackle emergency situations.
He also said, that the Deputy Collectors (Sub-Divisional Magistrates) of all the 12 talukas have been provided Rs 5 lakh each for use to tackle such monsoon-related disasters and restore order.
The Rane-Shetye-Arolkar trio had in their calling attention motion sought to know what the government had done in the face of the severe flooding and multiple cases of mud-slides cutting off communities along the Valvanti river in Sattari-Bicholim.
However, several legislators cutting across party lines raised issues of their own constituencies where people and communities faced hardships due to flooding and mud-slides over the past two weeks that the State has witnessed heavy and incessant rains.
Aam Aadmi Party's (AAP) Benaulim MLA, Venzy Viegas, raised the issue of severe flooding in his constituency, blaming it on neglect of the issues related to the Western Bypass embankments being ignored by the Sawant-led government.
"This is not just a calamity. It is a direct result of the government's failure to act on expert advice," Viegas said, adding that the Sawant government has ignored the recommendations of their own Union Minister Nitin Gadkari's expert team which suggested construction of retaining walls, nullahs, desilting and dredging of river Sal to prevent flooding.
Ms Rane who moved the motion, demanded that the Tulshimala road flooded and damaged by the overflow of the Valvanti river must be repaired.
She said this road is part of the national highway and needs to be restored immediately besides repairing the protective wall along the Valvanti river in the region.