Non-local has no right to build in CRZ: Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority TNN Apr 22, 2012, 01.29AM IST
PANAJI: A non-local person who purchases land within 200-500m of the high tide line but is not a traditional inhabitant or plying a traditional occupation cannot construct a dwelling unit or a farmhouse in CRZ area. The new CRZ 2011 regime laid this down in law, but the Goa Coastal Zone Management Authority has made it watertight in a landmark order recently after a Delhi-based resident applied to it for construction of a farmhouse within the CRZ of Mandrem village. "Merely purchasing land within 200-500m in CRZ areas for purpose of putting up a construction, cannot confer traditional rights on the purchaser as equivalent to a person belonging to local community/traditional inhabitant of that area, nor can such rights be claimed for the purpose of putting up a dwelling unit/farmhouse in terms of CRZ Notification 2011," GCZMA member secretary, Michael D'Souza has stated in his order. As per the CRZ Notification 2011, the construction of dwelling unit/farmhouse, etc in CRZ areas shall be only for local community/traditional inhabitants of the coastal areas, the order notes. Rakesh Sahani, a Delhi-based resident, had filed a writ petition in the high court seeking directions to be allowed to construct a farmhouse in Mandrem. After NGO Goa Foundation opposed the petition, the court disposed of the matter, referring it to GCZMA to decide. GCZMA while rejecting the application, in an order dated March 28, 2012, ruled that CRZ 2011 permits only traditional inhabitants along the coastline to construct or reconstruct their dwelling units. "The traditional rights and customary uses while regulating construction activities of dwelling units in the coastal areas evidently discloses the law-framers intention that construction of dwelling units have to be within the ambit of traditional rights and customary uses prevalent and practiced in the concerned locality, i.e. the coastal area," the order states. Pointing out that it cannot be expansively used to refer to non-traditional individuals, the order further states, "Obviously it will relate to the persons engaged in traditional occupations in such locality which would include fishing, toddy tapping, plantation, etc."