From: anil desai <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:44:14 +0000 Subject: My letter to Herald Soter wrote:
Finally, after being taken on a merry-go-round, we all seem to have landed at square one on GBA's third birth anniversary. For three years the people were cheered into participating in the process on ODPs and RP 2021 only to be now told that none of this planning carnival had any legal sanctity. Response: This is the letter I sent to Heraldo (on 9th March with a further request on 13th March )after the last magnificient victory for GBA when after a phone call from Dr Oscar, Digambar Kamat accepted all the GBA demands and Goa was saved.( The letter was not published) *And the Oscar goes to...* by Anil Desai Last week the Oscars were handed out in LA. I think we should have our own Goan Oscars since we host an international film festival of our own. Goa is already blessed with a real, live Oscar and we now know, after seriously suspecting it for three long years, that this one has been bagged by our Aam Aadmi CM Digambar Kamat. This Oscar had already claimed to have saved Goa in Dec 2006, and later got himself nominated for the "Indian of the Year" award by CNN-IBN. Now, three years on, he admitted in the columns of this paper that he was let down by Digambar Kamat with whom he had "danced footsie". To those unfamiliar with the phrase, to "play footsie" is to collude with someone in a covert way. Last week, this Oscar was in the news again. It was reported that he telephoned Mr Kamat and summoned him to meet with the delegation led by Sabina Martins that included, you guessed it, the Oscar man himself. CM Kamat did what he does best. He patiently listened to the delegation and accepted their demands in full. As we know by now, Kamat is great at accepting demands but beyond that he does nothing about them! So there you have it. Goa has been saved for the third time in less than four years, on this occasion by our valiant and upright CM Digambar Kamat. First, after the agitation of December 2006, the RP2011 was scrapped. Never mind that soon thereafter critical files of the Aldeia de Goa project went missing, or that DLF was given the go-ahead to initiate construction in what is clearly an eco-sensitive area amongst pristine hills. Never mind the lakhs of acres of land that have been usurped by illegal mining, or converted from agricultural use for megaprojects. Never mind the builders from all over India and some even from foreign countries who are operating freely in our tiny state. Never mind that construction activity continues in full flow everywhere in Goa. Goa has been saved, if the CM, Oscar, and GBA are to be believed.. Then we had the SEZ drama. "Not my fault" said the "brave" Chief Minister, "it was Parrikar who started it". As soon as a threat was issued by Matahny Saldanha, the Aam Aadmi CM immediately promised to cancel SEZ. Never mind that the compensation to SEZ developers may run into hundreds of crores. We Goans have broad shoulders. Our debt already runs into billions of rupees. What's a few hundred crores here and there? Not an inch of land that had been allocated for SEZ has been returned to the Goan people but we should rejoice that Goa was saved for the second time. And now come the joyous tidings that CM Digambar Kamat and his co-pilot Oscar has saved Goa for the third time under pressure from the same activists. I am utterly confused, not knowing whether to laugh or cry at this repeat farce. How many times are Goans going to be defrauded by the politicians and these colluding activists? Now that Oscar has saved Goa with a simple phone call let us bring back Barkha Dutt for another open air show. Let it be held in Dr Pranab Roy's own plot in Calangute. Let's have Rajdeep write articles on Goanews with effusive praise for our Oscar and our Aam Aadmi CM. And as icing on the cake, let us award the Panaji MLA seat to our star footsie dancer Oscar and thus seal his alliance with Mr Kamat. An ex-editor who was allegedly given five lakh rupees by Mr Kamat and who sees Saffronites everywhere could be commissioned to pen a poem in praise of the Oscar-CM alliance. In Dec 2006 I was happy to support GBA. However, while stating publicly that they are apolitical, privately the GBA leaders played along with the Congress. I knew of this in Dec 2006 from personal experience. I was on the stage at the GBA rally at Azad Maidan. Many GBA leaders did not want me there because they perceived me to be in Manohar Parrikar's camp. Unfortunately for GBA, the compere for the meeting was an old friend and admirer of mine from our student activism days. During the rally, I was cued four times for my turn to speak only to be overruled. Finally just before the last speech by Oscar my name was called. No sooner had I started my speech than Oscar was signaling to me with hand gestures to stop. He clearly wasn't happy to find me up there. In 2007 elections were called and a few of us made a public appeal to Goans to support Parrikar in that election. The response from Oscar was very revealing. He wrote a piece two days before the election warning Goans that we, the open supporters of Parrikar, would be responsible if blood was spilled on the streets of Goa. He stated that he was writing as an individual and not as the convener of GBA (while cleverly using the platform GBA had given him). He might as well have added then and there that he was taking other sincere GBA members and Goans for a ride with his footsie dancing partner Mr Kamat - something he revealed only recently. What can the GBA do to regain trust? Mr Kamat must be told that we don't trust his words and that we need to see action. Let him cancel all the permissions given to DLF within a month. Recall what he did when the Supreme Court ruled in the Cidade de Goa case. He changed the rules and effectively subverted the judgement of the highest court in the land. It would be very easy for Mr Kamat to get an order signed by yet another Governer gifted to us by our masters in Delhi. Mr Kamat can demonstrate to us that he really means business. Secondly, he should stop his Tourism minister from filling the fields in Colva and get him to undo the damage. Otherwise while we are celebrating this 'wonderful' victory for GBA, I can bet my bottom dollar that under the new mining policy that he has promised by 15th March, most if not all illegal mines will become legal. DLF will be allowed to make mockery of the villagers from the area and even drive them out. Many more megaprojects will come up all over Goa. This discredited Chief Minister has shown time and again that his words have no value and that he and his govt are out to destroy Goa. Anil Desai
