PANAJI | Dec 02, 2015: In response to the case filed by an NGO challenging renewal of 88 mining leases, Goa government on Tuesday filed a counter affidavit in the Supreme Court and said that prima facie it seems that the NGO has some ulterior motives and is perhaps interested in stalling economy and progress.
In the affidavit, the state government has citied various litigations filed against many essential infrastructure projects such as bridges and garbage treatment plants, additional bridge on river Mandovi and state-of-the-art garbage treatment plant by the said organisation.
The affidavit also states that the mines and geology department had issued mining lease renewal orders between November 2014 to January 2015 and the petitioner has approached the court after a delay of almost nine months, which shows complete malice and an agenda to create unrest in the state economy.
It is further said that the state government of late has found that the approach of the petitioners is to target infrastructural projects which is against the interest of the state and the nation. This type of approach of the petitioner coupled with press statement smack of a different agenda. This essentially shows an ulterior agenda of not only halting the economic progress, obstructing the development of the state and the nation but also of a kind of a discreet agenda with some ulterior motives.
The Goa government once again put on record that the mining ban has left a lakh of people jobless and 3.50 lakh people have been impacted by the ban. The affidavit further states that the number of school dropouts in mining belt has drastically increased after the ban on mining in Goa, as it is directly and indirectly affecting hundreds of families including truck owners, e people who were working in garages and service stations, petrol and diesel stations, bank employees, barge transporting staff and workers, bus owners, small hotel and shopkeepers and so on.
(Source: http://www.navhindtimes.in/)