Friday, November 20, 2020
The Goa Forward Party has demanded that the government should immediately denotify the GoaTourismPolicy, 2020, as it failed to address key issues in Goa.GFPalso demanded that chief minister Pramod Sawantreleaseawhite paperon the status of Goa’s tourismsectorand the process followed by KPMG while drafting the policy.
GFP vice-president DilipPrabhudesai said the policy fails to take into account concerns raised by tourism stakeholders. “I think the chief minister should listen to his own minister, Michael Lobo, on this issue,” Prabhudesai said. He also said that Sawant should agree to Lobo’s demand for tourism minister Manohar Agjaonkar to be dropped from the post.
“If theCMis transparent, he should present a white paper on tourism, right from the Goa Tourism masterplan of 2016 to this policy,” Prabhudesai said. GFP said the policy offers no new ideas.
Panaji: The government should immediately denotify the Goa Tourism Policy, 2020, as it fails to address key issues in Goa, said Goa Forward Party (GFP) on Wednesday. GFP also demanded that chief minister Pramod Sawant release a white paper on the status of Goa’s tourism sector and the process followed by KPMG while drafting the policy.
GFP vice-president DilipPrabhudesai said the policy fails to take into account concerns raised by tourism stakeholders. “We demand that the tourism policy should be immediately denotified and I think the chief minister should listen to his own minister, Michael Lobo, on this issue,” Prabhudesai said. He also said that Sawant should agree to Lobo’s demand for tourism minister Manohar Agjaonkar to be dropped from the post.
“If the CM is very transparent, he should present a white paper on tourism, right from the Goa Tourism masterplan of 2016 to this policy. What is the amount paid to the consultant, how much has been paid and why were Rs 3 crores and Rs 5 crores paid to KPMG. We should know what happened to tourism in the last four years,” Prabhudesai said.
GFP said the policy offers no new ideasand also ignores key aspects of Goa’s tourism potential, particularly bird watching, nature trails, monsoon tourism and waterfalls. “Things that have been said for the last 25 years by the government, things that have been discussed and never implemented have come up again in this policy. The timing is so bad that even the BJP cabinet ministers have said that the policy is meaningless and that the tourism minister himself is on his way out,” he said.
GFP alleged that the tourism policy has been hastily notified to benefit “certain hidden agendas for certain vested interests”. “KPMG received Rs 5 crore to prepare this policy, which is a 12-page document. This 12-page document will decide and shape Goa’s tourism sector. The policy preface itself says that 40% of Goa depends on tourism but took only 12 pages to decide what happens to this 40 per cent,” Prabhudesai added.
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