Is Roland Francis the new Paid Piper! And why does he not do the things he is asking someone else to do? Does he not know that this issue of River Princess defied resolution even during the last time when the BJP was in Govt. albeit thru the back door? Nascy.
________________________________ From: Roland Francis <[email protected]> To: "'Goa's premiere mailing list, estb. 1994!'" <[email protected]> Sent: Friday, 6 July 2012 11:57 PM Subject: [Goanet] Aires Fiddles While River Princess Burns the State The salvaging of the grounded and rusting River Princess off Candolim by a private firm will burn a hole of 99 crores in the present government's budget. 70 crores given by the Central Govt under 'disaster management" for the RP salvaging to the previous state Congress Govt was allocated to "other heads" making the present Manohar Parrikar Govt too embarrassed to ask for funds from the Centre again. Right To Information champion Aires Rodrigues is chasing windmills like the positions of Information Commissioner, the GMC Dean, the government clerk himself filing RTIs, govt advocates and all manner of other relatively inconsequential matters when such huge scandals ruining Goa's finances are begging to be exposed and investigated. This very public River Princess matter which has been affecting the environment, the coastline people and the govt for many years, could have done with some no-nonsense revelations like Aires has proved to be capable of. For example: Why was Anil Salgaocar who owned the vessel not held responsible for salvage costs and punitive fines. Why did the Centre so willingly allot 70 crores from disaster management funds. Was there an illegal Salgaocar-Centre trade-off. Where did the 70 crores go. At the cost of which Goa State expenditure will the 99 crores now come from. Which citizens and projects will be affected. While I am an Aires fan, I am of the opinion he should step back a little from harassing the Manohar Parrikar Govt on small matters and concentrate on "follow the money". Roland Francis 416-453-3371 [email protected]
