The Times of India 12.04.2013
Corporation of the City of Panaji to maintain Panaji gardens on its own
has 20 gardens. Can we spend so much on maintenance?” he questioned.
Furtado felt the government should have asked the forest corporation to
maintain the gardens without any charge.
The forest corporation
stopped maintaining the municipal garden from February 15, though the
agreement ended last October. S Aggarwal, MD, GFDC, said the forest
corporation had stopped maintenance since the agreement with the CCP was
not renewed.
Joe D’souza, former CCP consultant, was of the
opinion that the garden should be maintained by the GFDC. D’souza said
when he was part of the GDFC he “had planted nearly 120 species of
plants which were planted to form a mini-botanical park exhibiting the
plant ecology of Goa including flowering as well as fruit-bearing plants
like mango and cashew among others.”
He criticized the holding of carnival festivities in the garden stating
that it had damaged the garden with some sprinklers, hedges and lawns
being affected. He questioned why the state biodiversity board had not
intervened in the matter as “according to the Biodiversity Act, any
commercial activity taking place on government land having a bio-reserve
or harbouring biodiversity should essentially take the permission of
the biodiversity board”.
CCP commissioner Sanjit Rodrigues said that the CCP was now maintaining the Panaji gardens within its jurisdiction and around 40 CCP staff had been assigned to the job.
