Dear Miguel One cannot fight cancer with a CROCIN tablet. Going back to the original land scam in Goa (the mining industry), no one has been held accountable or penalized or gone to jail. No amount of well-intentioned protests by people of good-will is going to stop the land mafia. The most effective solution is to review current transactions but also those going back, say 5 years. Those found in violation should be penalized and sent to jail, AND the project/development torn down and bull-dozed. Now that will get the land mafia's attention.
Protests come and go and the land mafia waits it out, attrition wins. I am willing as I have written before to raise money (say 5-10 lakhs as a start) to open an office called GOA OFFICE OF LAND ACCOUNTABILITY (GOOLA). This office can hire a few lawyers and activists to review transactions, use the RTI act to obtain information, file PILs, educate the public, assist gram sabhas and panchayats review large transactions. It is the people's office, a central clearing hosue where various groups can come together. If we know something illegal has happened and don't do anything about it, are we not complicit? Do we really believe any large land transaction has not involved a bribe? Are we for law and order? So my question is: are there a few lawyers and activists willing to staff this office? They will be paid and need to do the above full-time, not something as a volunteer in their free-time. Are Goans going to allow their land to be stolen or are they going to say ENOUGH? Regards, George --- Miguel Braganza <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Dear George, Politics is "current affairs" not archaeology or paleontology. It has to be dealt with propectively or at best a few months in the past. There are laws to that effect. e.g. the CRZ is applicable after 1992 and the Gram Sabha in Goa is after 1994. We should not get too ambitious or we will end in a soup while trying to cook the goose or make a fillet of the real estate sharks ;-) Mog asundi. Miguel FROM: [EMAIL PROTECTED] DATE: Fri, 2 May 2008 22:43:29 -0700 (PDT) SUBJECT: Saving Goa from land abuses I am surprized there has been no mention of Gram Sabhas going back in time, say the last 5 years, to review all licenses granted and the legality of various mega/large contructions. Why shouldn't ALL mega/large projects be reviewed? Some of the mega/large projects have refused to sell to Goans and only entertain foreigners and non-Goans as customers, treating our people as second-class in our own land. Why not investigate ownership patterns when Goans were denied the right to buy?
