E-Paper
NGT dismisses appeal against demolition of Goa BJP MLA’s Nazri Resort
Lobo is also facing a case of forgery that was filed by the member secretary of the GCZMA, for allegedly fabricating a letter that claimed that the property was located beyond 500 metres from the HTL
The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has dismissed an appeal filed by the Goa Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA and former minister Michael Lobo, who had challenged an order of the Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority (GCZMA), which had directed the demolition of a four-storey hotel Nazri Resort that was allegedly built violating the CRZ norms.
The GCZMA member secretary Johnson Fernandes said he would await a copy of the order before deciding the future course of action. “I have not seen the order. I can only comment after I have seen a copy,” Fernandes told HT.
Lobo, who is a partner in M/s Elite Builders, had argued that the GCZMA, in its order issued in 2018 directing to demolish the structures and to restore the land to its original condition within 15 days, had erred in judging his hotel to be built within 500 metres of the high tide line in the village of Calangute which nonetheless was build using a construction licence that was granted before 1991, the year the CRZ notification came into force.
Lobo, who completed the construction in the year 2008, claimed he did so based on a licence obtained by the previous owners of the property and placed on record a permission letter dated 16.05.1989 to press his case.
“We have scrutinised this document at our end and found that the permission was granted by the Panjim Planning and Development Authority for raising construction of residential flats, which contained stilt +3 floors and that this permission was to exist only for three years, which was made non-transferable by the granting authority specifically,” the NGT bench of Dinesh Kumar Singh and Vijay Kulkarni ruled.
The NGT also found that the party’s arguments that the maps were drawn erroneously to show the property falling within the 500-metre high tide line, as per a map drawn up in 2006 would not be applicable.
The NGT observed that if the 2006 map was not considered it would mean that the property would have to be judged according to the state’s Coastal Zone Management Plan of 1995 which had marked the whole village of Calangute as a CRZ area.
“Therefore, if we apply this position of law in the present case, the CZMP approved for Goa in 1996, should prevail over HTL drawn by DSLR with the assistance of NIO,” said the NGT.
“The map which has been annexed with the impugned order showing the property in question by yellow colour to be lying in CRZ area, should not be taken into consideration as the correct position and this Tribunal must go by the CZMP 1996… the 1996 CZMP would place the entire Calangute Village in CRZ area because, by that time, no HTL had been drawn,” the NGT ruled.
Lobo is also facing a case of forgery that was filed by the member secretary of the GCZMA, for allegedly fabricating a letter that claimed that the property was located beyond 500 metres
from the HTL.
