Goa's capital Panjim is sinking

BY Dr. Joe D'Souza
courtesy Cybervoices, NavhindTimes, Goa

PANJIM, July 16, 2002

The rhetoric of good governance and clean administration by the BJP government has been proved false by the rain gods. Within a week of the onset of monsoons the capital city of Panjim, and, the constituency of the Chief Minister was reeling under floods.

The roads everywhere were with waters knee deep.

There were several accidents, with cars falling into culverts meant to drain off water from the city into the river Mandovi. The drains were choked with plastic, the trees although trimmed by the Electricity Department and the Panjim Muncipal Council were uprooted, blocking roads; the scenario elsewhere in Goa was no different, the normal monsoons saw life paralysed, houses destroyed with uprooted trees, falling like nine pins. The only good thing which the Chief Minister promptly did, was to give financial aid to the victims of the “Monsoon Malady” at the cost of the humble tax payers of Goa and ensure popularity for himself and his party .

Not long ago in the columns of a local daily, I had indicated that Panjimwas in distress due to corruption and greed among politicians. The unscrupulous real-estate lobby together in league with obliging bureaucrats and avaricious politicians have plundered Panjim and its surroundings. The steep hill slopes which are essential to soak in water and act as “sponges” or “rain absorbing carpets”; be it at Altinho or at Dona Paula, are today covered with concrete jungles.

Although Town and Country Planning rules are clear that no constructions be allowed on slopes with 1:10 gradient, the urban surroundings, specially along hill slopes are covered with buildings and other concrete structures destroying the lush landscape all together.

The planners in the erstwhile Portuguese regime had blue prints of drains, culverts and storm water pathways to channelise the waters from the monsoons showers from the hills into the low line areas around Miramar, Patto marshland, and an equilibration pond near Portais, close to the building where North Goa Planning and Development Authority is now housed. They were fully aware that during the high tide, the waters from river Mandovi would rise above the ground level in Panjim and flood it. Hence the low line areas, the water balancing ponds at Portais, the mangrove marshlands at Merces, Santa-Cruz and around Patto Bridge were planned, and, used not only to receive and collect the river waters during high tide, but the rain waters during heavy monsoon showers as well.

The Portuguese administrators built culverts and drains in Panjim in a scientific manner so that even under threat of heavy showers and even cyclones the city was protected by trees and sand dunes; thus the adverse effects of storms and floods did not affect the citizens.

But what has happened in the last decade has been atrocious. The drains and culverts neatly placed from Altinho hillslope to the river Mandovi are obstructed and reclaimed by the real estate lobby, the one sided prunning of trees and covering up the root region with concrete by the administration of Panaji Municipal Council and the Electricity Department has made the trees with weak roots to lean dangerously in one direction.

Thus these trees which were supposed to cut off the speed of the winds during monsoons and act as lungs of the city are uprooted at the slightest action of the monsoon wind and cause accidents, while instilling fear among the residents in the city.

The hills and hill slopes in and around Panjim, which were once emerald green and were the aquifiers absorbing the rain waters and thus charging the ground water and which also supplied clear and clean water to the residents of Panjim who had wells, in each & every house, are today covered with concrete grey jungle. The rain water precipitation over Panjim city is no longer absorbed into the ground water body as in the past, but is drained into the city over the tarred roads and through the concrete jungle.

The Panjim city, which in reality, is a reclaimed marshland of the nineteenth century, is today suffering from an acute stress of soil erosion. The silting of Mandovi river, due to unscientific human activities in Panjim over the last 20 years has added nails to our coffin of woes.

The glitter of the BJP slogan of good governance has been exposed as empty and meaningless. The BJP government today is known for its “Indifference” and not for its difference. Panikar only created a temporary wave in his favour by booking opposition MLA’s from the Congress for acts of corruption, other wise none of his decisions have reached it logical conclusions like the stopping of the matka menace and the Miramar Sex Scandal which he vowed to end.

But the indifference shown to corruption in his own government, has raised eye brows and created doubts in the minds of the people of Goa regarding his intentions and potentials. The attempt to expose Ravi Naik, and the PWD contractors in the Rajiv Kala Bhavan Scandal at Ponda, once the minister was out of the BJP, is one clear instance.

The BJP Government and the Panjim Municipal Council has spent several crores of rupees in the frequent digging and covering up of drains and culverts in Panjim and resurfacing the tar on roads in the city, besides giving a pseudo face lift to the council building in the heart of the city.

The inconvenience caused through the frequent digging in 2001, was indicated to permanently solve the problem of flooding of Panaji. But as an “activist” Aires Rodrigues claimed in one of his writings that the councillors or the “city fathers” as they are affectionately called, constituting the present Panjim Municipal Council (PMC) are equally corrupt and inefficient as their predecessors.

The President of PMC, Ashok Naik has squarely blammed the Public Works Department of the Goa Government for all the present malaise of the Panjim city. But one wonders as to how the chief officers of PMC has allowed this malignancy to initiate and continue, inspite of several powers bestowed upon him and the council, making the responsible and duty bound to inspect as well as to grant permissions for construction activities within the city limits.

The government machinery seems to be in sixes and seven. This is a clear case where the left hand is ignorant of what the right hand is doing. For example the Goa PWD built a Police outpost building at Dona Paula without informing the PMC and getting its approval.

The officers in the PMC are known to involve themselves in various activities and private business during office hours. And very often those working in the council reportedly acquire tenders for road widening, asphalting, resurfacing, digging, cleaning in the names of their close relatives or involve themselves in ‘binami’ transactions. The councillors in Panjim only churn out souvenir magazines with their photographs and messages, sponsored fully by the real estate sharks who are responsible for the destruction of Panjim.

No doubts the Municipal Engineers, other officers and even clerks and accountants are owners of machinery involved in carrying out public works, if not owners of hotels and restaurants.

Ever since Parrikar became the MLA of Panjim and now the Chief Minister of Goa, he has harped on good governance and deliverance. The only solace for the people of Panjim is that the people here have remained alive by the grace of God, despite the increased cases of malaria and enteric diseases due to stagnation of rain water all around and the mixing of sewage water with the tap water as a result of water logging. Incidentally, the sewage pipeline runs very close to the domestic water pipeline, although it is unhealthy, dangerous and an unscientific exercise. This year over 4500 slides were screened to detect the malaria parasite. Nearly 1500 persons were found positive for the deadly Plasmodium, Falciparum malaria parasite.

Well waters in Panjim have high load of enteric micro organisms.

The ordinary people of Panjim in particular have to wade through flooded roads with stinking garbage floating all around. The renovation of Panjim market with lakhs of rupees from the taxpayer account, has added more filth and stagnation of refuse rather than giving quality facilities to the people of Panjim, as promised by the BJP.

One does not understand the logic of the Chief Minister giving crores of rupees subsidy or incentives to the tourism sharks and hoteliers at the cost of the common man.

How can this sinking of huge funds in tourism sector help Goans, when the infrastructural facilities to support tourism are badly lacking.

Is it to payback and thank the hoteliers, who had supported the BJP in the last elections? No doubts, tourism is slowly dying in Goa. With the steep increase in deaths of people including foreigners due to malaria, enteric infections, AIDS and crime, tourism has suffered. There were 2,60,000 tourists in 2001 compared to arrivals of 2,92,000 tourists in 2000. With grounded ship ‘River Princess’ at Candolim and oil pollution on our beaches, can tourism grow?

The unscientific constructions on hill slopes and the reclamation of land near to Home Science College now housing the T B Cunha School and the sports ground around housing Campal, has allowed has caused the rain waters in Panjim to stagnant.

This is because the low lying areas of Miramar, Portais Patto and Santa-Cruz have been reclaimed and today are above the water level which they were supposed to receive from the Panjimcity.

To add to the woes of Panjim, the mangrove forests and marshland around Santa-Cruz, Patto Plaza, and Merces too are destroyed - reclaimed & transformed into housing complex and private garages and commercial units.

With incessant rains the soils in Panjim are slowly carried - into the Mandovi basin. This soil erosion coupled with siltation of river Mandovi basin is adding stress on the terrain.

The centre of Panjim is slowing “caving” in a form of a depression.

During a discussion with Gomantak Times Editor Pramod Khandeparkar, a person who has observed Panjim’s transformation over the years, he too expressed his studied observation that the heart of old Panjim city is slowly sinking. The unscientific mushrooming of the concrete jungle in lowline areas, cutting of hill slopes, increase in plastic garbage choking drains, blocking of drains by perpendicularly erected buildings, by filling up culverts, the disuse of ground water from domestic wells, destruction of mangroves; all add up to make Panjim venerable to the forces of nature.

So, will Panjim sink to become a Archaelogical city for the Future?

It is a pity that the wells in Panjim generating pure water during the Portuguese regime have to close down today. Like Calangute, which has destroyed its ground water potentials with sewage percolations, the numerous hotels in Panjim, too have contaminated ground water with a high load of enteric bacteria. During our recent scientific survey of the wells in the city of Panjim, we were surprised to note that the wells in the heart of the city are the breeding ground of mosquitoes and contains large loads of microorganisms which act as feed for the mosquito larvae.

While the world over, the decentralization of the water distribution is widely accepted and acknowledged, in Goa the water distribution is still centralized and often technically unfeasible and uneconomical. Bringing water to urban areas with pipelines from far away places not only contaminates the water with pathogenic microorganisms, but it is also widely observed that the brownish water which reaches Panjim is covered with mining rejects and contaminated with iron and traces of manganese.

Greed, corruption, lack of foresight, lethargy, ignorance, egoism, selfishness and low initiative among the councillors, the legislators and the bureaucrats, who are supposed to collectively plan and execute developmental schemes, have resulted in the dying of urban areas in Goa. The real estate lobby, hoteliers and the business houses have been in regular touch with the Chief Minister. They have been successful in making the present government believe that tourism can usher prosperity even if it is haphazard and unscientific.

No doubt, the budget on tourism has increased four times over the period of two years, however, the tourists coming to Goa have dropped, crime has increased and the quality of life of the citizens has deteriorated. With hoteliers as advisors of the Parrikar government, can one expect sustainable development? It is high time the people of Panjim in particular and the people of Goa at large, should wake up to save Panjim and Goa from the imminent disaster before it is too late to save Goa’s capital from sinking further, by banning the reclamation of low line areas and mangroves all around Panjim and stalling the further mushrooming of the concrete jungle in an unscientific manner all around.
 

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