Govt mulls satellite survey to keep encroachers off beaches

Panaji: State govt has proposed conducting a satellite survey to demarcate the boundaries of public beach properties, the tourism department told Bombay high court on Monday. It told the court that private property owners along the coastal belt keep tampering with boundary stones to mislead the tourism department that structures encroaching upon the public beach are, in fact, not on the public beach.

To curtail this menace, govt proposed conducting a satellite survey to demarcate the boundaries of beach properties, the tourism department told HC.


The court is hearing a petition by Menino Fernandes concerning commercial exploitation of public beaches at Calangute and Candolim. He went to HC alleging that the state selectively and arbitrarily chose to take enforcement action against his illegal structure while deliberately ignoring numerous other illegal structures that continue to exist on the Candolim-Calangute beach stretch.

During the hearing before the division bench on Monday, additional govt advocate Neehal Vernekar told HC that this geotech survey demarcating private property qua the public beach will be a one-time exercise, and that the demarcation will remain in perpetuity. Even if there is any tampering of boundary lines, the authorities will be in a position to find out and take immediate action, he told the court.

The present situation is that private landowners move boundary stones and tamper with boundary lines, and tell the tourism department that the structure in question is on their private property and not encroaching on the public beach. The tourism department cannot move for demolition and, each time, has to resurvey and establish the actual boundary and position of the structure in private qua public property, he told HC.

As the entire beach stretch comprises a large area, it was divided into 12 blocks for the purpose of the survey. Three blocks were completed, and the department requires additional time to complete the entire survey, he told the court.

Advocate Rohit Bras de Sa, representing the petitioner, told the court that permanent structures were built on the public beach stretch in the guise of temporary structures, where some were demolished and re-erected. Those who put up the structures on the public beach are claiming them to be on private properties and are running commercial operations in the illegal structures and profiting from illegalities, he told the court.

HC granted two weeks’ time to govt to file an affidavit in the matter.