JOIN USActivists in Goa cry foul over inability of SC-appointed team to meet them
Activists in Goa have cried foul over the inability of the Supreme Court-appointed central empowered committee (CEC) to meet them during their three-day visit to Goa to examine ground realities at the site of three central government-backed projects related to road and rail expansion and the setting up of a power transmission line stretching through contiguous protected forests in Karnataka and Goa.
A statement issued by Goyant Kollso Naka (GKN), a collective of NGOs who have been protesting against the three projects, said that requests sent by its members to the CEC for an appointment did not evoke a response.
"The CEC must also consider the fact that there is very little traffic on the existing three roads from Goa across the Western Ghats. The fraudulent fragmentation of each project into small bits to hide the impact and the failure to consider the cumulative impact of the three projects are also major violations that demand the projects to be rejected," a statement issued by GKN said.
The CEC during their three-day official visit, first travelled to areas in Karnataka, including the Kali tiger reserve, where works related to the proposed projects are expected to be taken up, before travelling to Goa late on Friday by a special railway inspection vehicle.
The three controversial projects in question involve the doubling of South Western railway tracks, expansion of the NH-4 and transmission of a power line from Karnataka to Goa, which were cleared by the National Wildlife Board amid the pandemic.
50,000 trees in and around Mollem, a village located along the Goa-Karnataka border, have been slotted for felling to make way for the three central government projects.
Activists, as well as Opposition parties, fear that the projects are aimed at facilitating increased transportation of coal from Goa’s Mormugao Port Trust to the steel mills in Karnataka’s Bellary district and nearby areas.