GSIDC fails to complete work in time for BRICS and now abandons it. -- By Nisser Dias

It has been a week since the international summit BRICS has concluded and along with it the work on the 4 lanning of Old Market-Colva road also seems to have been abandoned by the Goa State Infrastructure Development Corporation (GSIDC).

The work of the extension of the road and the multi-channel drain on either side of the road has been abandoned and not a single worker can be seen carrying out constructive work.

This is causing a lot of heartburns among the residents and the business community along the 3.5 – 4 kms. stretch. Residents and businesses are suffering. Stores, restaurants, hotels and showrooms along the stretch do have proper access to their homes and establishment. The muddy road is causing a lot of dust pollution with the movement of the vehicles which is getting into homes and shops. Water lines have been damaged during excavation and water is stagnating infront of commercial cum residential complexes.

GSIDC, had commenced work on this road during the last week of August. During the time 10 – 12 heavy earth moving machinery could be seen working at a time of daily basis. Some machinery was used to demolish structures that had come up in the acquired land, others excavating just roots of huge trees, some earth moving machinery was used only

to dig trench for the multi-channel drain, some were used to fill excavated mud into trucks to charter it. Basically work was being carried out at a rapid to get it completed for the BRICS summit but it completely missed the deadline. Even the chief minister Laxmikant Parsekar had boasted that the road would resemble the Parliament road in New Delhi.

79 year old Jose Gomes says it is causing inconvenience, “we have difficulty in getting the car in the garage, our doors are windows cannot be opened because of dust and all the ten houses in the row are facing the same problem”. He is upset also because GSIDC cut three of his high yielding mango trees, “they were planted in the acquired area but they were

giving shade, the government could have put benches under them alongside the extended road”. “The contractor said they would complete the work fast but after BRICS I can’t see a single worker all along the stretch”.

Suchita Naik runs a general stores, “the road looks open and broad but they have complete it, my customers or suppliers do not proper path to walk on, I do not want to make it an issue but they have to complete it at the earliest, but there does not seem to be any workers maybe they will commence after diwali”.

GSIDC chairman Dr. Pramod Sawant when contacted seemed unaware of the work being abandoned and assured to immediately ask his manager to get in touch with the

concerned contractor to know the status of the project.

The managing director (MD) of GSIDC is Manohar Parrikar’s boot licked Sanjit Rodrigues. This is not the first project that he has undertaken and left underdone. Miramar-Dona Paula is another road which GSIDC had taken and after almost five years it cannot be completed because its MD is inefficient.

Basically Sanjit Rodrigues is a qualified cook who even worked in the a star hotel for a brief period before being made the deputy collector and posted in Margao. And he used to write legal orders without having qualifications to do so. Being a ‘Yes sir’ to Defence Minister then chief minister has helped him to grow. What does he really understand of engineering to be made the managing director of an infrastructure development corporation.

First he put the people of Miramar-Dona Paula into  trouble and now people of Benaulim and Colva.