Issue of garbage collection fee dominates Moira gram sabha

MAPUSA: The issue of garbage fee rocked the Moira gram sabha on Sunday where villagers agreed to pay the garbage fee provided the panchayat produces data pertaining to houses, commercial establishments and rented rooms in the village. Following the demand of a gram sabha member the garbage committee was dissolved.

The gram sabha of Moira panchayat was held at the village panchayat on Sunday which was presided by sarpanch Riya Belekar along with panchayat secretary Smita Parab in the presence of panch members and observer Ivo Lawrence. On the issue of garbage fee, Angelo Mendonca questioned the sarpanch on what grounds the panchayat will impose the fees? He said there are shops running without proper licenses, signboards are displayed and nothing is paid to the panchayat. He asked the panchayat to provide data regarding number of houses, commercial establishments and rented houses in the jurisdiction of the panchayat.

Smita Parab informed the villagers that a memorandum was received from the government last year and other village panchayats have already imposed the garbage fee. There are around 1200 houses in the panchayat jurisdiction. Parab said that about 150 commercial licenses have been issued in the village. She informed the gram sabha that currently the panchayat is collecting both wet and dry garbage on a daily basis for which the panchayat is incurring a monthly expenditure of Rs 45,000.

She also informed the villagers that the financial condition of the panchayat is bad and hence it was necessary to introduce the garbage fee.

The gram sabha members said that they have no issue in paying the garbage fee but the proposal should have come from the garbage committee. The villagers claimed that the garbage committee is dormant and needs to be reconstituted, hence it was decided to dissolve the existing committee and hold an extra ordinary gram sabha on December 2 for appointing a new committee.

Vigilia De Sa suggested that the government is ready to provide a fund of around Rs 7 lakh if the panchayat takes up the initiate to distribute green and black buckets to all households for segregation of garbage.

Following the discussion, members suggested that the garbage fees of around Rs 150 will be charged for households, Rs 300 for small commercial establishments, Rs 5,000 for bigger commercial establishments like hotels, boutique villas, halls etc.

Florence Mendes demanded that all inactive committee should be reconstituted so that active members can be enrolled. Accordingly, it was also decided to amend the traffic safety committee, and senior citizen committee.