BY SUJOY GUPTA

The forerunners of the people’s movement against the Regional Plan 2011, the Goa Bachao Abhiyan (GBA), faded into the background after convener Dr Oscar Rebello resigned from the group following criticism from GBA members. In the absence of a powerful people’s movement to oppose mega projects, the GBA debate has risen again. Reproduced here is an excerpt from an article listing the issues that ail the GBA.

THE HISTORY of India is pockmarked with tales of backstabbing and backbiting. Of shallow traitors who have destroyed what heroes attempted to create. When Muhammed bin Qasim attacked Dahir of Sindh, it was Dahir’s astrologers who joined hands with the Muslim invaders to facilitate their first intrusion in India after defeating Dahir. Then traitor Jaichand backstabbed the warrior Prithivraj Chauhan. Jaichand joined hands with Mohammad Ghori to ensure Chauhan’s defeat.

In a queer, indirect but brutally effective way, Goa’s most spontaneous peoples movement has been backstabbed, butchered and cut to pieces by its own people, mainly a body of self-seeking internet tigers and a bunch of rabble rousers, who spend all their not so quality time giving speeches and shouting from public platforms.

STRENGTH AND WEAKNESS

GOA’S biggest strength was the Goa Bachao Abhiyan, a movement of people. It is now Goa’s biggest weakness in the people’s space, since it is not the common man from a village tinto, a mother in her balcao, and an uncle on his field, who is at the centre of the movement. But a bunch of self-centred individuals, who have cleverly plotted to force a man like Oscar Rebello out of the GBA, and his trusted aides Ritu Prasad and Patricia Pinto out of the Task Force to formulate the Regional Plan.

In the guise of doing good to the people of Goa, of giving them back the power to be a part of the participative process of planning, they have actually handed back power to the very lobby of politicians and builders, who would lose if the genuine recommendations of the Task Force came into effect. By no means has power gone back to the politicians and snatched away from people indirectly. Forces within the GBA, the same forces who prevailed upon Sabina Martins to send a letter to the government "rejecting" the interim Task Force report in the absence of convener Oscar Rebello, have colluded and plotted to bring Goa’s most forceful people’s movement down. It’s an act of criminality Goa will not forget. And most importantly forgive.

And, to add insult to injury, people within the GBA and those merry men and women who show up for the party at every rally, dharna or public meeting, went back to their desktops to churn out absolute hatred and muck against a gentleman like Oscar Rebello, accusing him of having "sold out". If the Task Force report prepared by Ritu Prasad and Patricia Pinto among others and supported by the then convener Oscar Rebello, is examined seriously, any right thinking and, crucially, right meaning, individual will see its strengths.

DIFFICULTIES

THE Task Force noted the difficulties in implementing planning methodology according to the 73rd and 74th amendments, since the Five Year Plans, which should be the basis for the preparation of the Regional Plan, have already been formulated top-down, rather than bottom-up, till 2012. They then mooted a comprehensive plan for people’s participation by requiring the Task Force to explain the plan proposals to the people at the grassroots level through a ‘Taluka Committee’.

Since there are 189 panchayats, 14 municipal councils and one municipal corporation in Goa, it proposed to extend the time for public to submit comments and objections about the plan to four months instead of two. It also stressed that land utilisation made up to 2021 should be relooked at after 2012, when the next Five Year Plan is drawn up, hopefully through the ‘bottom up’ process, where settlement plans at municipal and panchayat level would be prepared by the concerned local body within that local area, and then looked at at the taluka level by the taluka level committee.

But the Taluka Committee would only be a ‘regulatory body’. Approvals would have to be issued by the local body after consultation with the Taluka Committee. This meant that had the proposal been approved by the Task Force and the government, it would be local bodies like panchayats and municipalities which would be responsible for both approvals of projects as well as licensing.

BEYOND INTELLIGENCE

THE shocking irony is that the reasons why the Task Force report was ostensibly rejected were no reasons at all since the basic grouse of the internet tigers and public speakers within the GBA was that the Task Force had not outlined a process where the village panchayats would be consulted. It perhaps went beyond their intelligence to see that the Task Force had gone a step further. It had made a plan where the local bodies would not just be consultants, but the final decision makers.

This very Task Force, in its report, completely neutralised the absolute discretionary power of the government by the amendment to the TCP Act, which excluded central and state government projects from the purview of the Regional Plan 2021.

So, was that a problem for Oscar’s rivals within the GBA who called for his ouster and also for the rejection of the Task Force report? Was it they who had "sold out" and joined hands with those who would be affected by a report prepared by the blessings of Oscar? Or was it also the fact that those who plotted his ouster were so jealous and enraged with the support and goodwill that Oscar had, that they couldn’t bear to see him around any longer? People used to getting cheap publicity by storming offices and abusing people through public platforms hated their thunder being stolen by a strong-willed, soft spoken articulate doctor who honestly tried to treat Goa and rid it of its ills, by giving it a strong dose of people’s power. A dose that would have eventually seen Goa get rid of politician and builder lobbies looting the state.

If the people who make a living out of running down other people and personally insulting them travel to Goa’s interiors and hear folks in the grassroots, they will sense the anger of the people, for what was done to Oscar.

It is not just Oscar Rebello who has been brought down by traitors within the GBA, the people of Goa too are victims of this deceit. Let us ask some of the leading lights of the GBA to answer just one question raised by the people of Goa. ‘Why did this happen to Oscar?"

We know the answers, but there is still hope. The GBA should not be allowed to be hijacked by individuals. The time has come for the people of Goa to rise and create another body of genuine people with Oscar at the helm to carry this forward. If we back off now, history will never forgive us.

Courtesy: www.goaunltd.com