'Green' land conversions despite RP'21?
GOANEWS DESK, PANAJI | 06 December 2010 12:30 IST
The Regional Plan 2021 has left major lacunae to allow land conversions and constructions in the eco sensitive zones, until the surface utilisation plans for the rest of nine talukas are notified.
The state, on 24 November, has notified such plans for only two talukas – Canacona and Pernem.
Until plans for the rest of the nine talukas are notified in stages at the rate of two talukas every month, the provisions of Regional Plan 2001 would remain in force.
This was disclosed by none other than chief town planner Morad Ahmed today.
As per the provisions of RP’01, section 17 A of the Town and Country Planning Act provided for conversion of paddy fields.
But RP’21 had included all paddy fields in villages in the Eco Sensitive Zone 1, imposing total ban on converting this land
Eco 1 also consists of government and private forests including sanctuaries and mangroves, khazans, rivers, nallas, ponds, sand dunes, sandy areas, mud flats and no development slopes, covering almost 54 per cent of Goa.
Eco 2 covers 26 per cent, consisting of cultivable land, orchard, natural cover, fish farms, salt pans, irrigation command areas, archaeological parks as well as heritage parks/trail/buffer etc.
Ahmed however said Eco 1 and 2 cannot be made applicable to the whole state immediately since it required proper mapping as per the survey numbers.
“It would be possible only after detailed taluka plans are notified. Till then, we have to follow RP ‘01”, he argued.
However, the provisions of VP 1 and VP 2 have come into force immediately, Ahmed informed, since the RP’21 report has listed all these villages falling in both the categories.
The VP 1 and 2 areas cater to Floor Area Ratio (FAR). While 80 per cent FAR applies to VP 1, 60 per cent FAR applies to VP 2.
At the rate of two talukas per month, the whole process of notifying surface utilisation plans of all the 11 talukas could be completed only by April or May next year.
this whole issue is creating vast corruption and provisions for land deals to be made with dubious records and cheating people who do not know all details of issues presenting itself and applications of these processes. more corruption and profit for those who are criminals in an already totally corrupted state
In the era of E-Governance where huge amount of public funds are spent on this scheme,it is expected that all the maps and other details of the RP 2021 should be available on the web site of the Govt.and the URL should be made public so that all the interested can see the plan...
The public funds spent on e-governance could be said to be well spent if the information is easily available on the web to the public....