Dear Editor Sir
Kindly publish this letter in the Letter to the Editor column. Regards Stephen Dias Retired Scentist Dona Paula 5.7. 2019 OPEN LETTER TO OUR WRITERS I decided to write an Open Letter to our fellow writers instead of our Government officials such as Chief Secretary, Chief Minister, Governor, Ministers, GSIDC, CCP, TCP, MLA’s etc who I usually write to as I find they have become immune of what the writers and newspapers write/ suggest/advice. No one is listening to us. At least this time perhaps writers may find my Open Letter interesting to act upon and maybe ultimately it will benefit the public at large. To begin with, I read in our section of the press some headlines written by two of our writers. One is “Pathetic condition of Goan roads by Shri A. F. Nazareth from Alto Porvorim and another with the title “Good, motorable roads our fundamental right by Shri Aires Rodrigues from Ribandar. I always read such issues in newspapers -- especially on the pathetic roads in our state. Generally first we blame the PWD/ RTO or Minister of Transport whoever may be. (Mostly Mr. Sudin Dhavlikar was targeted before who is now out of power.) My point of context is why only the potholes and why not other issues such as 'Vehicle pollution, Drinking water, Health Services, Sanitation, Sentinel schemes, Garbage, Noise Pollution, Corruption free government, etc'? These are also most essential and fundamental issues for the common man which are neglected despite many assurances. In my opinion the most alarming issues nowadays are (1) the black smoke coming out from vehicular traffic especially KTC buses which can cause cancer and respiratory ailments, and (2) Potholes which can damage our bones or spinal cord, or can cause accidents which can kill or disable for life. I supposed the rest can be tolerated as they are not as serious as those two issues. We have in Panjim two private agencies for checking pollution from vehicles. One in the city and one on the way to Bambolim -- But I have noticed some of these pollution checks are reported negative although they are polluted vehicles. Why? There could be some reasons. One is cash, another is doing favours for a friend. A third reason could be ineffectiveness of probe sensor insertion into the silencer which can also give rise to inaccuracy of the readings. Someone must conduct secret spot checks on these agencies. Stephen Dias Senior Citizen Dona Paula 5.7.2019 Sent from my Samsung device