Another fresh bid to finalise land for IIT-Goa campus

Panaji: With exactly a year remaining before the assembly elections, state govt has initiated what appears to be a last attempt to finalise land for the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Goa campus by shortlisting two new sites and reevaluating one previously shortlisted location.

The shortlisted three sites include comunidade land at Usgao, the SEZ site at Keri, Ponda, and the previously identified site is the sugar factory, Dharbandora.Chief minister Pramod Sawant said govt will soon finalise the site to set up a permanent IIT- Goa campus in the state. Last year, state govt dropped its plan to set up an IIT-Goa campus on over 14 lakh sqm of comunidade land at Codar, in Ponda taluka, after it was strongly opposed by the local residents.This was the fifth site identified for a permanent campus for the institute that became operational almost 10 years ago — in 2016 — and has been functioning from a temporary campus at the Goa Engineering College, Farmagudi, since. Several land parcels identified for a permanent campus for IIT-Goa over the years were either rejected by the Union education ministry’s site selection committee or faced protests from locals due to several reasons.

State govt earlier began demarcating land at the site of the Sanjivani sugar factory in Dharbandora to set up a permanent campus for IIT-Goa, but shifted its focus to the site at Codar. A senior govt official said the sugar factory site is still being considered to set up a permanent IIT Goa campus, but nothing has been finalised.Prior to that, plans to set up a campus over nearly 10.5 lakh sqm of land at Rivona in Sanguem — which was officially approved by the Union education ministry in Jan 2024 — were dropped after govt faced issues pertaining to the title of the land.Centre earlier rejected land selected for the IIT-Goa campus in Sanguem on account of it being unsuitable for the project. There were also protests from farmers who claimed that they were cultivating in the area.When the project was proposed at Melauli, Sattari, locals organised a sustained protest against it.In Jan 2021, there were clashes between protesters and police personnel at the site. Soon after, the CM, citing “people’s sentiments”, announced that govt move the project elsewhere.