Goemkarponn desk
MARGAO: Shadow Council for Margao today wished and appealed that the High Court to appoint an independent commissioner to submit an actual status report on the waste management system of the Margao Municipal Council.
Strongly condemning the Margao Municipal Council and the concerned authorities for their repeated failures to meet assurances given to the High Court, Shadow Council for Margao stated that it was time for the High Court to realize that these un(concerned) authorities are only wasting precious time of the court, by giving false submissions, while the actual picture and status at Sonsodo is far different than what is portrayed on paper to the hon’ble Court, SCM Convener Savio Coutinho charged.
SCM and concerned citizens of Margao and Fatorda have umpteen times attempted to draw the facts before the Hon’ble High Court; however, the court is misguided in a very schemed manner, Coutinho said further.
All through, we have the Council invoke that the High Court is monitoring the works of waste management. However, this statement about High Court monitoring is only when they have to push forth a dubious scam of theirs, Coutinho said. We had raised the door-to-door waste collection scam, which was the root cause of the accumulation of waste at Sonsodo, as the waste delivered could not be treated due to its mixed nature.
Further, we offered to assist the Council for the Remediation of the accumulated waste at a far lower financial burden to the public exchequer. However, for obvious reasons, they prefer to come out with fat tenders; since June 2020, the Council has spent 86 lakhs and 3.37 crores on Remediation work upon the so-called segregated waste collected by the waste collection agencies. And now another 4 crores is likely to be spent on yet another Remediation job.
Coutinho also charged that emergency-like situations are deliberately created so that the vested interests can push forward their dubious schemes of expenditures by following shortcut methods without following Codal formalities and awarding works to handpicked contractors and agencies who will, in return, take care of the interests of their masters.
SCM hoped that the High Court would take a serious view of the actual facts concerning the waste management at Sonsodo, lest the matter before the Hon’ble court will be a never-ending one; and will only waste the court’s precious time, SCM concluded.
