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5th Annual Konkan Fruit Fest
Promenade, D B Bandodkar Road, Panaji, Goa
16-18, May 2008
http://lists.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet-goanet.org/2008-May/073789.html
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More rape of Goa by the land mafia, see
http://www.richmondepark.com/birdsEyeView.html
The forward below was sent to me. George
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We appeal to all self-respecting lovers of Saligao and Goa to boycott this
elitist project for the
following reasons:
1. Because of its exhorbitant price range and its elitist lifestyle it is not
a project that
solves the housing needs of local people.
Read their page "Richmonde Group" here:
<http://www.richmondepark.com/richmonde.html>
(quote)
"Richmonde Constructions Pvt Ltd., a part of Tikamdas Hiranand Jewellers
(Mumbai) & Sangani group
of companies (London) with enerations of experience have excelled in their
respective fields.
"Both the companies have history of catering to the **rich and famous quality
lifestyle products,
from around the world.**
"The company guarantees best creation of their visuals and believes in
long-term relations with
their clients. We now announce our exciting new development, Richmonde Park
Villas located in
best area in Goa, with top designers, consultants, contractors and advisors as
part of our team."
(unquote)
The villas are not marketed in Saligao or Goa and may be booked only in Mumbai
and London as is
evidenced here: <http://www.richmondepark.com/contact.html>
(quote)
FOR BOOKINGS CONTACT
Vinay Tejnani (Mumbai ) - (+91) 98195 37300
Mrs Bena Sangani (UK) - (+44) 78667 65474
REGISTERED OFFICE (INDIA)
29/31, Dhanji Street,
Meena Apts., Ground Flr,
Zaveri Bazaar,
Mumbai - 400 003.
Tel: (+91) 22 2342 0247
BRANCH OFFICE (UK)
Northwood Hills Estate. 62,
The Broadway,
Joel Street,
Northwood,
Middlesex. HA61PA
Tel: (+44) 01923 85333
Fax: (+44) 01923 829707
(unquote)
2. It is purely a business venture built with national and international
capital that is using
Goa to launder black money. Plain, vanilla flavoured, greedy profit is the only
aim of the
investors. They do not give a damn about the demographic and infrastructural
impact of 28 villas
on Grande Morode and Saligao.
Where will electricity and water come from? Where will their sewage and
garbage go?
Good, potable drinking water from Saligao's water table, ends up in hotel
swimming pools on the
coast. This means that local and foreign tourists, daily swim in our drinking
water! Do you know
what this means to us, our very dear Saligaokars who will buy into Richmonde
Park? As villa
owners, would you also like to chill out in Saligao's drinking water that will
undoubtedly flood
your 2 swimming pools and marble bath tubs; fill your fancy ceramic cisterns to
flush your hand
carved, granite toilets; water your plush lawns and verdant landscaping? Would
your conscience
and bonding to Saligao permit you to luxuriate in such eternal wellsprings,
while village wells
run dry?
We have a shortage of electricity in the village. Several vaddos have very low
voltage in the
evenings because of the excessive load. As happens with such mega-projects,
Richmonde Park will
end up bribing in order to corner electric power for itself. Can you imagine
the amount of
electricity this single project will hog for all the common and private luxury
amenities that 28
upmarket villas will need? And this diversion of electric power will be at the
expense of the
rest of us who do not have the oney power to 'attract' the current to our homes.
Will you sleep peacefully at night, after you look out the window of your
grossly over-lit villa?
Will you fall off to sleep at all when your gaze sometimes accidentally falls
beyond the walls of
your flood-lit park, into your low-voltage, Grande Morod neighbouhood and into
our sometimes
blacked-out village?
Saligao is already battling in court and in the village itself the illegal
dumping of garbage on
our hill, above the Salmona spring. Our panchayat has no solution to the
garbage problem.
As a future Richmonde Park bhatkar, where do you intend to dump your garbage?
And with at least 5 water sellers stealing Saligao's drinking water from our
underground water
table, do you think the contactors of this project will be buying water from
outside the village?
One does not need to have the gift of prophecy to predict that Richmonde Park
will be built and
maintained in future with drinking water supplied illegally from Saligao's
wells.
Please boycott, high powered, over-consuming Richmonde Park which is invading a
traditional
village that does not have adequate infrastructure for its own populace.
3. From its location, look *now* at:
<http://www.richmondepark.com/location.html>;
its Birds Eyeview, please do not miss:
<http://www.richmondepark.com/birdsEyeView.html>
it is our guestimate (which we are hoping is not true) that this project is
being *sowed* in
Saligao's paddy fields (can someone please verify?). It is difficult for us to
imagine that some
Saligao bhatkar still owns such a big plot in the settlement area.
If our hunch is true, then this project is thoroughly illegal and against
everything we have been
fighting for in the movement against the Regional Plan 2011. It is quite
simple: one just
cannot convert fields and green areas.
Correction: one can convert anything if one bribes the right people, enough!
4. Most profits of the investment will vanish out of Goa to Mumbai and London.
Look at their Credential page here:
<http://www.richmondepark.com/credentials.html>
(quote)
Mrs. Bena Sangani
(London, England) Chairman.
Mr. Vinay Tejnani, (Mumbai) CEO
Mrs. Rita Mody Joshi (Goa)
Architects/Interior Designers
Mr.Mahesh Rane (Goa)
Technical Advisor
Sangrajka Co (Mumbai)
Accountants
Mr. Rajesh Dhanuja (Mumbai)
Contractors.
(unquote)
Except for the architect and a technical advisor (whatever that is; maybe to
'technically'
expedite the local paperwork with what is commonly accepted as *speed money*?),
everyone else,
including the *contractor*and *accountants* are from outside Goa. Saligao has
at least one world
class architect and other not-so-famous ones, several contractors and highly
reputed chartered
accountants, but no, Richmonde Park investment needs to be protected and
serviced by an outside
work force. So much
for this investment benefitting us.
As we have said in an earlier mail, the only benefits this investment will
bring us is a fair
number of vacancies or 'ayahs', butlers, cooks, maids, sweepers, errand-boys,
gardeners, drivers,
watchmen, common labourers and similar trades-people for the daily needs of the
villa owners.
Unfortunately, Saligao's educated and white-collared, middle class like us,
give such jobs a wide
berth, leaving them exclusively to the poor and migrant youth who snap them up
in a trice.
5. And lastly we urge you to boycott Richmonde Park because they have stooped
to the sewer to
peddle their project worldwide, via their website. It is not even good
advertising with its
classy
and subtle lying. This is blatant lying, prostituting Saligao' and Goa in the
cheapest and most
vulgar ways.
Come on Saligaonetters and Goenkars worldwide...do we not have even some self
respect left?
Here are a group of politically and economically powerful vermin (even they
crawled out of the
woodwork at last!), who have captured Saligao, our *mother*, are drugging and
gang-raping her.
And because they are enjoying every minute of it (there is' good money in the
investment as you
have been told), they are now selling our 'mum', prostituting her to you and
me. Now playing the
role of 'madam', now doubling up as *pimp*, to get us to join in the rape of
Saligao...and pay for
the carnage too! Our response..."Hey, I like this. This is a little pricey
even by western
prices, but I do not mind putting together USD 200,000/- to secure my future,
even if it means
ravishing
my 'mum' in the bargain!"
Someone else sobs, "Oooo...our middle class sensibilities are offended at such
a stark view of
reality. How can these gross, activist types belittle this 'ah, so
prim-n-propah, genteel and
strait-laced group' by spewing their venom in a public forum such as
cyberspace! It is fine if we
blue nosed Victorians express a little priggish discomfort in the privacy of
our 'boudoirs', or at
a night out with the boys at our local pub. But asking us even to *merely
view* the grim reality
that they live in everyday life in the Saligao is not what we joined this
listserv for..." ;-)
Hey, come on folks, we are joking of course in the 2 paras above, just a bit of
comic relief...but
as Ashley Delaney says, this is not personal (notice we do not even refer to
writers by name!) and
as he says again, "get real"...for heaven's and Saligao's sake.
Do you Saligaokars outside the village know...can you even imagine, what it is
to be ruled by the
present bunch of *elected* reps, both at the village and state level? Do you
know how it feels to
*see and witness*, day in and day out, aligao being destroyed by the hour, by
an obnoxious bunch
of
elected vermin?
Locally, Richmonde Park is their work! The destruction of
Salmona Spring was their work. The garbage dump on our hill and
the present garbage problem is in large part due to their
negligence. The dismantling of Saligao is due to the corruption
rampant in the sacred precincts of the panchayat ghar.
We can go on, but for now our personal call is: **Boycott
Richmonde Park!**
It is payback time to Saligao. Do not abuse your 'mum' by buying
into Richmonde Park. Do not forget that a large chunk of what
you are *now*, is due to her: much of your unique culture, your
faith, your education, your outlook on life, some of your most
cherished values, were fostered in her schools, her church,
temples, chapels, pulpits and confessionals, her lush paddy
fields and cashew-strewn hills, her dusty red roads, gurgling
springs and nullahs, her playing fields, festas and 'natoks'.
We are not done yet...so do not go away, even if we have
unfortunately bored you to death so far! There is more e-action
to this *boycott*.
So stay tuned and in solidarity with all of us who struggle at
ground zero.
M&M.
muriel & mario,
"villa faria",
5/3 donvaddo, saligao.
bardez. goa. 403511.
tel: 0832-2278276 / 2409999
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
