Updated on: Thursday, December 20, 2012
The Calangute panchayat plans to develop an education hub on the outskirts of the village. Addressing a press conference on Tuesday, Joseph Sequeira, a panch, said that a good quality education hub would be a plus point for tourism in the coastal village. He said that the hub would have a college and schools. The hub is proposed to be built on land belonging to the comunidade of Calangute in the vicinity of the cattle-pound on the right of the Calangute-Mapusa road.
The press briefing was held to announce the setting up of the new market-cum-bus-stand complex on 36,000 sq mtrs of comunidade land. Calangute MLA Michael Lobo, attorney of the Calangute comunidade Anthony D'Souza and zilla panchayat member Abelina Menezes were also present at the venue at Bodkovaddo.
Lobo also announced the widening of the road from Bodkowaddo to Baga along with a gutter and a side retaining wall at a cost of 2.8 crore. "That is estimated to rise to 3.6 crore," according to Lobo.
Work on the market complex is expected to start once the land acquisition is completed, for which the comunidade has already given an NOC, according to Anthony D'Souza. He added that there are a few tenants whose claims will have to be settled prior to that.
The village panchayat has agreed to bear the cost of settlement with the tenants, according to Sequeira.
The complex, besides housing the market and bus-stand, will also have space for taxis, rent-a-bike operators, pilots, and also all government offices such as electricity, PWD, etc, clustered together for the benefit of the public.
"We will complete the market in collaboration with the GIDC before the end of the BJP government," he said.