Lead Story

Goa hotel projects beached

Savio Rodrigues & Neeti Mehra - Mumbai

The progressive development in Goa is in danger of derailment with the brakes applied on the controversial Goa Regional Plan 2011, stalling 13 hotel projects, primarily mixed-use developments and luxury retreats, covering approximately 1500 hectares of land located in the southern and northern tip of the picturesque state. Informed sources revealed that leading international hotel brands are caught in this developmental quagmire. This is another blow to the state which has quite a few hotel projects caught in legalities due to flouting of developmental laws.

The regional plan will see development of Goa's 7.5 crore square metre area, primarily the tourism magnets - the green belts and coastal stretches, including restricted and protected areas, where most of the hotel projects are slated to come up.

Voicing the concerns of the industry, Ralph de Souza, chairman, tourism committee, Goa Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and group chairman, de Souza Group, said, "The chamber has taken a stand that development cannot be at the cost of the environment. The regional plan should be a guideline and not a law, and it cannot supersede existing laws laid down for protecting the environment and regulating development." He expressed concern over the stalled projects, saying that the players involved would be necessarily affected. He pointed out that though the maximum impact would be in the interiors, a trickle down effect would trigger the collapse of tourism in the long term. However, he admitted that "the state needs a plan for its progress and for driving economic growth, while preserving its natural beauty." The popular tourist destination is facing an infrastructure problem and while it still grapples with unregulated development, lack of enforcement of the existing laws, de Souza says, is by far the biggest problem.

Tourism continues to be a top draw to this state and main contributor to its economy, with Goa attracting nearly 20 lakh domestic tourists and 3.4 lakh foreign tourists in 2005-06. Pankaj Mathur, GM, Cidade De Goa, giving further insight said, "The regional plan has to be balanced and a think tank should be constituted. We need to draw a line to development, but at the same time we can't turn our back to it. It is with this the state has achieved prosperity, else it would have been a dead destination."