"Sab Chaley Aao" Tourism : No control over "Adventure Tourism Operators" in Goa.
Tourist Operators operating against the cautionary advisory issued by Goa Government, regarding public and tourist visits to Waterfalls & Water bodies.
The Government of Goa and it's top ministers have been harping and stressing on the public, not to visit Water bodies; specially the Waterfalls and Laterite quarries; after a series of unfortunate deaths in last few days.
The Forest Minister Vishwajit Rane, who himself a few days back grandiosely announced "Waterfall Circuits" tourism, where tourists and locals can visit waterfalls in the hinterlands, during Monsoon; took a U-Turn and said that even FIR would be filed across people, who would visit Forest areas waterfalls.
While this advisory has been plastered over all across media, through every channel available; the tourist operators on the other hand, continue their business as usual, despite the cautionary advisory.
A screen-shot of an Instagram post shared on Twitter by @expavextra; shows the apathy of the situation. With not much respite from the rains yet, situation being extremely fluid,as far as weather is concerned; a Porvorim based Adventure events company solicits customer for a trek to Sada Waterfall on 23rd July.
All this while, when Forest Minister is on record, saying that Government is now examining which water body spots or waterfalls to be allowed, for the tourists and locals in coming days, after a comprehensive evaluation of all the sfaety factors. A high level, Forest Deptt official has been deputed for this task.
While the Sada waterfall might fall in Karnataka, where the judicial powers of Goa do not apply; but the concerned tourist-operator in Porvorim, Goa based entity and hence should have heeded to the advisory issued by Goa Government; and thus refrained, from the activities, for a few days, till the clarity comes.
What is incomprehensible, is the fact totally lost on the said tour operator, is that, Waterfalls like Sada, situated on higher echelons of Ghats like Chorla, are very susceptible to random events like sudden gush of water and cloudburst.Such events always catch the tourists totally off-guard, leading to grave and huge disaster, with several families shattered for life.This brings in question, why such instances of Government advisory, to tourists and tourist-operators go on deaf ear?
As reported earlier, Goa does not have any "Adventure Tourism Policy".
Which means there is no comprehensive guidelines for the such adventure tour operators, nor thus, there is any supervision.
Government of Goa does not know how many such adventure tourism operator operates in the state, what is their state of operations, are they fit enough even to operate, specially from the Tourist safety point of view.
As the recent deaths at Waterfall and Quarries have demonstrated that; Safety is not an issue; unless there is a fatality.
Now Government is saying , that it would patrol such Waterfalls; Collectors are asked to report on how many Laterite quarries are there in their jurisdiction; where a sensible government could have done all this long before the Monsoon started.
When, the Government of Goa itself is found to be frantic, what could be the state of, other such tourist-operators is just a question mark.
Government of Goa has been always exhorting the domestic tourists to be "responsible, but the fact of matter is that, the government itself does not know, how "responsible" the tourist-operators are?
Clear and comprehensive adventure tourism and Water Sports policy with water-tight regulatory and supervisory frame-work is the need of hour, with strict adherence; rather than each minister of Goa announcing a new "Keyword + Tourism "initiative", every other day.