With an aim to make Goa ‘Garbage Free’ by 2020, the State Government has in-principle agreed upon imposing fine on littering in public places and banning use of plastic in the State.

The Government on Thursday constituted the Goa Waste Management Corporation (GWMC) under chairmanship of Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar, who held the first meeting this morning.

The meeting decided to make necessary amendment to the existing Waste Management Act to introduce penalties for littering in public places and for use of plastic below 40 microns.

The Corporation intends to have a special subject on Waste Management to school and higher secondary students as part of their curriculum.

Deputy Speaker and director of CWMC Michael Lobo said that government is committed towards making Goa garbage free by 2022 and hence various measures in those directions have been proposed.

He said that to make Goa garbage free, the first step would be to ban the plastic below 40 microns completely and heavy penalty will be levied on use of plastic bags. “We will also impose heavy fines on littering in public places,” he said adding that necessary amendment will be done to the existing Act.

The meeting also decided to give all required infrastructure to the panchayats like bins, trucks, for segregation, collection and transportation of waste.

The Corporation has also decided to take over the beach cleaning system, which is currently under the Tourism department.

Lobo said that the Corporation has in-principle decided to take over the beach cleaning management as it finds that the tourism department does not have the mechanism to handle the same.

The then opposition MLA and current Minister Rohan Khaunte had exposed multi-crore beach cleaning scam, which is currently under investigation before Goa Lokayukta. At present the beach cleaning is handled by Drishti Lifesaving Services Pvt Ltd.

Team TNV