Mirabag villagers lay siege to Sanvordem panchayat over bandhara

Margao: A tense situation gripped the Sanvordem panchayat office on Monday as irate residents of Mirabag stormed the premises in a fierce gherao, demanding the scrapping of a proposed 50 MLD bandhara project they feared could devastate their village.

The protest came just a day after villagers took to the streets in a torchlight procession from Curchorem to Mirabag.


Hundreds of residents from Mirabag stormed into the panchayat office, raising slogans. The protesters accused the panchayat of complicity in a project that was thrust upon them without any consultation. “We were never taken into confidence,” fumed a resident, echoing the sentiment of the crowd.

Villagers warned that the bandhara would bring flooding, destroy fertile agricultural land, and cause irreversible environmental damage to the region. When sarpanch Chinmayee Naik and a few other elected representatives entered the panchayat, they faced a volley of questions.

They demanded that the elected representatives join the sit-in protest in the village that has been under way for the last 13 days if they were with the villagers in opposing the project. They also questioned the failure of the panchayat to get the dug-up trenches filled at an earlier abandoned site by the contractor of the bandhara project.

With the situation threatening to boil over, police teams were deployed at the panchayat premises to maintain order. Sanguem mamlatdar Siddharth Prabhu also rushed to the spot, attempting to pacify the agitating villagers.

He told protesters that the deputy collector has already written to the WRD to take appropriate action. However, the crowd was in no mood to leave without concrete assurances. They demanded the immediate filling of trenches dug by the contractor, citing safety hazards for residents.