Everyone desires a piece of Goa. Everyone wants to own a little plot or large tract of land in Goa. Many wish to settle in this emerald of the East. Some dream about their own vacation home. Post Covid, most have realised the essence of residing in a place less polluted, scarcely populated and with ample open spaces. Goa fits the bill. Land has invariably remained the foundation on which Goa's socio-political terrain has been shaped. After Goa's liberation, the state's first chief minister Dayanand (Bhausaheb) Bandodkar introduced radical land reforms with a principle of "land to the tiller."
He earned immense popularity and mass approval but lost the opinion poll, India's only opinion poll to date while espousing the cause of Goa's merger into Maharashtra. Interestingly, he prevailed in the election held within months of the opinion poll. Simply put, people wanted his land reforms and also their land non-merged.
60 years later, Goa's two top leaders, Chief Minister Pramod Sawant and his immediate number-two minister in the cabinet Vishwajit Rane, have chosen the issue of land to establish their political supremacy against each other. After taking over as the town and country planning minister, Vishwajit decided to suspend and probe the development plans formulated during the first term of the Pramod Sawant government.
He created a committee to investigate the illegalities committed in the designing of these plans. Within days he pointed out with concrete evidence how huge chunks of land were converted from agriculture to settlement by blatantly violating numerous provisions of several laws.
It is no secret that Vishwajit Rane desires to be the chief minister of Goa. He is bestowed with some of the most powerful portfolios as a compromise pact, and could practically run a parallel shadow administration. He has identified a plump target that can gain him a lot of brownie points with the Centre, while putting the CM in a spot.
Rane is ripping apart the development plan framed by the former BJP minister turned Congress' leader of opposition now - Michael Lobo. Lobo deserted the BJP in the face of the last election. BJP's central leadership has not taken this lightly.
Lobo completed his full term with the BJP as their minister and tried everything within his power to ensure that the Congress attains power in the state. Congress' present double-digit tally is only because of Lobo.
Interestingly, the plans composed by Lobo during the previous BJP government are getting dissected. Although it is disconcerting for the CM, the centre's disdain towards Lobo is enabling Rane to move ahead full throttle with his plan.
Rane asserts he wants to unearth and penalise those who indulged in land scams. The chief minister, on the other hand, has initiated another 'Operation Zameen.' He has assembled a special investigation team to probe into the number of cases of illegal land selling by falsifying documents.
Many of these properties were acquired by forgery inconnivance with government officers. Later, these lands were sold to individuals from outside Goa who dreamt of purchasing a parcel of paradise.
The CMO is estimating that this scam amounts to a minimum of Rs 1000 crores. Arrests have begun and an FIR has been filed against some government officers also. This scam is extremely serious. People have been disenfranchised of their ancestral properties via forged ownership documents.
A system that is tasked with protecting these rights was complicit in committing these crimes. Officers who were duty bound to safeguard the titles of innocent citizens connived with land grabbers to sell large tracts of properties. This happened under successive governments and no one cared.
Pramod Sawant has now aggressively decided to get to the bottom of this swindle. It is a righteous political tool to demonstrate his command over governance. This is a fit case where typical criminals, forgers, government officials and in all likelihood some political godfathers are involved.
Will this case reach as high as those godfathers? And will the administration buckle under pressure or stand strong when the arms of the law reach the necks of the powers that be? Such political contests are welcome.
Both Vishwajit Rane and Pramod Sawant are attempting to establish their prowess by doing something worthwhile for the state. People are sceptical. No one will believe that the politicians are operating out of the purity of their hearts, and it is also doubtful whether the brouhaha will reach its logical conclusion.
Their track records stand against them. However, this is something new. No one has attempted to do what both of them are aspiring to do right now, and both deserve a chance to prove their credentials. If Vishwajit Rane succeeds he would have eliminated one of Goa's biggest scams under the guise of 'development plans.' If Pramod Sawant completes the probe it would help hundreds of citizens who were duped and robbed of their ancestral properties for no fault of theirs.
On the face of it, this is a win-win for the state. However, we Goans have learnt to take everything that the politicians do with a pinch of salt. Goa's land reforms began after liberation from the Portuguese regime, to give land rights to the masses who toiled on the land. Sixty years down the line a couple of politicians are still fighting their political battle to achieve the same goal.
In Goa, as per the Land Revenue Code, tenanted agricultural lands cannot be converted to settlement zones. As per the findings of the committee appointed by Rane, around 2.2 lakh sq mt of tenanted land has already been converted. In the land grab matter, one police station in North Goa will hand over more than 20 cases of title documents fraud to the SIT. Most of these cases are from 2020 to date. As a citizen, one can only hope that these cases are not lost in political translations along the way.
