Porvorim: The Town and Country Planning ( TCP ) board, on Wednesday, formally approved the removal of all 10 contentious villages from the Greater Panaji Planning and Development Authority, while choosing to retain Taleigao and stretches of Kadamba plateau as planning areas. Minister for town and country planning Vijai Sardesai also said that the Town and Country Planning Act would be amended in the coming months.“We have taken a decision to stand by our commitment to drop the contentious villages from the Greater Panaji PDA ,” Sardesai said, while addressing the press after the TCP board meeting.Following the board’s decision, Greater Panaji PDA will now include Taleigao, the left-side stretch of land from Goa University to Shyama Prasad Mukherjee stadium, and a 300-m-wide ribbon of land along the Kadamba plateau bypass road.“The left hand portion of the land is largely government acquired land and the Kadamba planning area will include only a 150-m portion of land on each side of the bypass at Kadamba plateau from the old Milroc Ribandar complex to the Kadamba Fern area,” chief town planner Rajesh Naik said.Villagers from planning areas of Bambolim and Kadamba plateau that were proposed to be included under the Greater Panaji Planning and Development Authority and from Candolim and Calangute had staged several protests in the capital and even held a five-day chain hunger strike at Azad Maidan. Sardesai insisted that the board’s decision was not based on the protests.“These decisions have been taken not because we have been forced or because of an agitation, but because we feel that what is good for the state has to be good for the people,” the minister said.The agitators had also demanded that the government amend the Town and Country Planning Act to include the 73rd and 74th amendments, also something that Sardesai appears to have paid attention to.“There are demands that the Town and Country Planning Act should be amended because it was framed in 1974. We should have an act that meets the challenges of the present day. So we are in the process of amending the act also. But these amendments will come in the assembly,” the minister said.Sardesai did subtly express his irritation with the protestors and said that the right forum to object or recommend policy decisions was in the legislative assembly though he did say that every person had “democratic right to go on a hunger strike.”“But paralysis cannot be allowed,” he said.

Stay updated with all the Latest Goa headlines here. For more exclusive & live news updates from all around India, stay connected with NYOOOZ.