Herald
Goa: Panaji: Sunday, 06 September 2015.
Inside story
of how the govt prepared the land for the golf course and villa project for
Leading Hotels; new zoning categories devised for backdoor entry for the golf
course project; Most land converted to settlement at behest of Handsell Goa Pvt
Ltd, a front for the ultimate beneficiary.
This is a
story of how a zone which was identified as “cultivable “ land in the Regional
Plan of 2001, and remained largely cultivable and orchard land in the draft
regional plan RP 2011 was converted to settlement in the final plan. As a
further icing on the cake, the concept of Eco Tourism Zones were introduced in
the Regional Plan of 2021, to rule out any impediments in the path of the
government’s blue eyed project. The massive scam had its genesis during the
time of RP-2011; when both zones were changed at the behest of land-consultant
companies managed by powerful political actors.
This assumes
significance in the backdrop of Chief Minister Parsekar backing the Leading
Hotels project, stating that investors need to be backed. However the manner in
which land use has been manipulated underlines how business has been brought
into area not meant to be developed in this manner. We all knew this. We are
just reporting how this was done
Zoning in
RP-2001
The village
of Tiracol comprises of survey nos. 1-16. Of these 16 survey numbers the Fort
falls in survey no. 1 and the remaining survey numbers comprise mostly of
tenanted lands which were owned by the erstwhile landlord Nagesh Shet Khalap.
According to
the first regional plan for the state i.e. the Regional Plan for Goa 2001 A.D.
(RP-2001) the land zoning was as follows: Yellow: cultivable land, Green:
orchard land and Pink: settlement area. One can notice that most of the village
was zoned as cultivable/orchard land. (see graphics)
Changes in
Zones from Draft RP-2011 and Final RP-2011
In the
subsequent regional planning exercise the Goa Regional Plan for Goa 2011 was
prepared (RP-2011). Here first a draft version of RP-2011 was prepared and kept
open to the public in November 2005 and thereafter the Final RP-2011 was
notified in August 2006.
The Draft
RP-2011 prepared a zoning for Tiracol which was almost identical to that of the
previous RP-2001. Using different colours the draft plan showed cultivable land
in light green, orchard in dark green and settlements in purple. Once again
most of the village was zoned as cultivable and orchard land. But thereafter
something changed dramatically in the Final RP-2011. The Final notified RP-2011
marked the entire village of Tiracol with settlement zoning.
The powerful
hand of Handsell Goa Pvt Ltd showed up
RTI documents
show that in the interim period between the Draft and Final RP-2011 (i.e.
November 2005 to August 2006) a request was made by Handsell Goa Pvt. Ltd.
on Dec 15 2005 to convert Survey Nos.
2-6 in Tiracol from Orchard to Settlement. Incidentally Handsell Goa Pvt. Ltd.
figured as consultant/company which asked for a fair number of land-use changes
in RP-2011, in the very survey numbers on which the project of Leading Hotels
is coming up, which is virtually all the survey numbers. This is evident in the
documents pertaining to specifics of land change requests for the village, in
possession of Herald. It was also during this time that the first of Tiracol’s
sale deeds was struck.
On June 15
2006 subsequent to the request for zone change, just weeks prior to the
finalisation of RP-2011, Magus Hotels and Real Estates (a subsidiary of Leading
Hotels) entered into an indenture with the landlords of Tiracol, the Khalaps
for exactly the same survey nos. 2-6. In subsequent sale deeds and
rectification deeds over 2007-2008 the entire village of Tiracol ranging from
survey nos. 2-16 has come to be ‘possessed’ by Leading Hotels. Following the
public outcry against the RP-2011 the plan was repealed with retrospective
effect in January 2007 as a result of which the conversion of the entire
village into settlement got shelved and the zoning reverted back to RP-2001
i.e. mostly cultivable/orchard land.
Zoning in
RP-2021
The latest
twist in zoning for Tiracol comes in the recent Goa Regional Plan 2021. In the
Final RP-2021 in Release-1 (which contained zoning pertaining to Pernem and
Canacona) a new zoning scheme was introduced called ‘eco-tourism’ which now
permitted construction in 10% of a property having a minimum area of 2 lakh square meters, even if the underlying
zoning was natural cover or agricultural land. Incidentally this zoning scheme
was never even suggested by the Task Force that prepared the Draft RP-2021.
Using this new zoning category the TCP then marked Tiracol as an Eco-Tourism
zone and by doing this it has essentially provided Leading Hotels another route
to implement its designs in the village.
The people of
Tiracol have been silent spectators. Their land, their village and their
futures have been taken over by some trigger happy planners, on orders of the
government of the day, who have painted zones into settlement to allow for the
march of companies like Leading Hotels, ostensibly to promote Eco Tourism.
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