Residents say people have already rejected any development on the Bhagwati plateau; Gramsabha Resolution still holds!!
Goemkapronn desk
CANACONA: Opposition is slowly and definitely growing over the reported moves to bring back the IIT-Goa campus or development/commercialization by concretizing the eco-sensitive Bhagwati plateau in Loliem village of Canacona.
Reacting sharply to the Social Welfare Minister Subhash Phaldessai’s statements from the fragile terrain of Bhagwati plateau on Sunday against the villagers who forced the government to shift IIT out of the taluka a few years ago, villagers are waiting for the right opportunity to strike back at the government.
“Some people’s stomach is still hungry. They will never let villagers live in peace,” is the first reaction when Citizens Committee of Loliem (CCL) President Dennis Fernandes saw the posts (videos and photos) of Social Welfare ministers along with some villagers visiting Bhagwati plateau.
“Only a barren mind can call a land barren. How can a computer engineer come to the plateau and call it a barren land? There need to be environmental experts to say it, this (Plateau) is the home of the tigers, bison, leopards, 5 different species of Deer, Slender Loris, Pangolin, Giant Squirrel, Dipcadi Concanese, and scores of other critically endangered species giving it the highest protected status,”. Fernandes, who was in the forefront along with several other like-minded villagers, had sustained agitations for protecting the Bhagwati plateau calling it highly eco-sensitive for the village and surroundings.
Another villager, on condition of anonymity, said, “The Villagers of Loliem had rejected the IIT project on the Bhagwati plateau. The villagers know the value of this plateau for their livelihood, water security, grazing lands, cattle, and so many other uses and services.
Only a few intend to get this untouched plateau commercialized for the sake of money.”
Fernandes added, “The powers of the land, our ancestors, and the future generations will protect its plateau. The people of Loliem will fight to keep the plateau untouched, come what may!.”
“Its not proper to pass comments now, as except for rumours, nothing is known to have come officially in the panchayat (local body). I will certainly comment once the panchayat understands the government’s actual intentions to inspect or explore the Bhagwati plateau or, for that matter, any other vacant land in the village’, is how ruling panch member and ex-Sarpanch Ajay(Ajit) Lolienkar reacted when asked for his views and panchayat stand on the recent developments. When insisted that Minister Phaldessai is on record having said, ‘government is exploring all vacant lands to put them to fruitful use. Lolienkar still maintained it’s just rumoured, let something come officially, and we will react accordingly’ keeping the guessing still in speculation mode,” he said.
It may be recalled that former Loliem-Polem Sarpanch Bhushan Prabhugaonkar, who was in the thick of controversy when the people might forced government to abandon the IIT project in Loliem, is seen prominently accompanying the minister Subhash Phaldessai during his Sundays visit to the plateau. Prabhugaonkar is also a former Attorney of Loliem Communidade and now a member, in whose name the Bhagwati plateau stands.
According to Prashant Pagi (RG assembly candidate of Canacona constituency), Loliem resident, since this IIT –Goa permanent complex was forced upon the village, people had risen en mass to oppose it; the project has already opposed the project and even the resolution passed in the specially convened gram sabha than still stands good even now. There is no change in it. ‘People were very clear to say that we don’t want anything on Bhagwati plateau and that resolution still stands’.
As for Social Welfare Minister Subhash Phaldessai’s visit to Bhagwati Plateau and his outbursts, it looks like the minister has no other work and leaving his constituency in Sanguem; he had come to instigate the people of Canacona for no reason. If it is forcefully put on us again, then people will come out in double force to again oppose the misuse of the Bhagwati plateau this time too. We had already started getting calls from concerned people to know what was cooking again.
