Our politicians take decisions usually in their interests and with scant regard to the existing laws made by them. They have got away with it as the common man has no ability to challenge. Where a challenge has been made as in the case of illegal mining, the ones effected with the judgement are those who had no ability to right a wrong situation and went along, viz: mining dependants. The actual beneficiaries have got away scot free.
Then we have the case of GIDC where the Government of the day uses this Corporation as a milch cow. Despite rules to the contrary the Government ordered GIDC to transfer 2 lac square meters of land to a logistics Company, something existing rules do not permit and that too while the code of conduct was in force. Most matters related to citizens is put on hold citing code of conduct, yet here such a big decision was taken one day before the election results. In the hurry GIDC transferred the property without receiving the charges in advance and just on an undertaking that the party will pay. Strange, but it happened because of meddling by politicians and a pliant bureaucracy.
We saw the swiftness with which the police acted against a local lad who was selling fruits from the boot of his car while parked at an open space near the Ravindra Bhavan. The reason the police acted was that he was obstructing traffic. One has only to walk down any road and see how many illegal business are operating, you can see mini vans from neighbouring states selling fruits and vegetables at junctions. Why are the police not acting in these cases. Again without a doubt there will be some meddling politician behind this move.
Be it mining, illegal deals in GIDC or illegal encroachments on the roads, they all have the blessings of politicians who think of them selves first and citizens and Goa only in speeches. These politicians usually pit one set of people against the other and come out trumps. The show goes on and the citizens watch helplessly.
The FORMALIN FISH has the same meddling politicians doing what they do best but this time they may have overstepped the line. The FORMALIN FISH effects each and every goan worth his salt including the die hard supporters of the same selfish politicians. The foot in the mouth syndrome continues from “’natural forming formalin” to “permissible levels” to “FDA officials had no right to do their job” it is all coming undone, there is no place to hide. Even the belated knee jerk reaction of banning imports a week after the first formalin fish was detected or rather not detected is off no use because the citizens had already acted and the empty markets bore mute testimony to their wrath. The wholesale traders accepted the ban without a wimper, they had too because there are no customers.
Even if you do not eat fish, they cat is out of the bag, in defence of adulterated fish they have pointed out that adulteration is a common occurance even in fruits and vegetables. Well if this was known why no action was taken?
Each and every goan is thinking, “I have got effected with this formalin fish and my beloved politician does not care for me”. If he did care he would have acted differently, he would have acted swiftly, he would have had some one go and check the source, find out which processors brought formalin and how much? Surely for this scale we are talking about barrels. They would have gone to the manufacturers of this hazardous chemical and found out who it was sold too. They would have checked stocks already in the State. Instead they are talking about setting up testing centres at entry points, we all know how porous the State borders are, we all know that a truck full of fish how can you take a sample, empty the truck? They are talking about banning imports. Shifting the wholesale market. But no talk about the main issue, ADULTERATION. There has to be someone responsible, the formalin as we know did not come there naturally. Adulteration is a criminal offence, why no arrests? NOTHING, NO ACTION ONLY TALK.
The police want the FDA to complain, who complained in the case of Maclon? Can they not act on a citizens complaint?. The FDA Director should actually be given a medal, she backed her official M/s Ida who helped open a can of worms. Unfortunately she is now awaiting a transfer as PA to IGP as it happened in the case of the Director Fisheries who did not follow the politicians writ. So we cannot blame the bureaucrats because citizens do not stand up for them when they are bullied by politicians.
Hopefully this loss of fish from our diet will galvanise us out of our sleep and we will become more aware that the politicians are taking us for a ride. The people of Goa have to act because they are the ones forced to eat poisoned fish. One way is keep the pressure on so that the judiciary takes notice and forces the Government to act and bring to book all those involved in this horrific and dastardly act. Goans say “No” to all fishy business.
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