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Goa's millennium rave party suffers a stillbirth

Sandesh Prabhudesai in Panaji

Following the government decision yesterday not to allow Jeh Wadia's 10-day-long non-stop rave party, the Goa bench of the Bombay high court today went one step further by declaring the Paradiso de Anjuna restaurant in Anjuna out of bounds to the revellers.

This followed the filing of a public interest litigation by journalist Peter D'Souza, who earlier exposed many illegalities by business tycoon Nusli Wadia's son in the local daily Gomantak Times.

Wadia, the event manager of the millennium bash, was expecting around 25,000 revellers from all over the world and the event was to be telecast live by Channel V. Several companies including Coca-Cola, Bacardi and the United Breweries had sponsored the mega-bash.

As the court hearing would resume only in January after the winter vacation, the Goa bench of the Bombay high court comprising Justice R K Batta and Justice R M S Khandeparkar directed the government to file a compliance report regarding the removal of the illegal structures built by Wadia and his associates.

Accepting the contention of D'Souza's lawyer Vishnuprasad Lawande, the court observed that neither Wadia nor Norman Azavedo, the restaurant contractor, had sought any permission to occupy over 80,000 square metres of government and communidade land or to hold the musical event for 10 days.

"There is no permission sought from the tourism department, excise department, collectorate, police or the sales tax department," observed the judges. As the organisers failed to produce a single valid document, the court also observed that they were illegally occupying the beachside land and hillock belonging to the government and the local communidade.

Pointing to the fact that construction in the form of fencing, steps, toilets, walls, tunnels and the terracing of the ground for the dancing floors was in total violation of the coastal zone regulations, the court instructed the government to take the necessary steps to stop such activity.

S S Keshkamat, the tourism director, later told journalists that he would immediately move to have all the illegal structures demolished while the police as well as the excise department would be told to stop any activity at Paradiso de Anjuna.

During the hearing, the court realised that even the beachside restaurant does not have a valid liquor licence and its lease contract had expired in September. While the state government was planning to let Azavedo retain it, the court has now disallowed him from occupying it.

Though the court did not go into the contention of Mahesh Jethmalani, Wadia's counsel, that it was not a rave party but a festival, the bench said the question of allowing even a mere dance does not arise as nothing is legal in the whole affair. Arguments over whether the use of drugs and loud techno-music is necessary for a rave party would be taken up during the hearing later.

Jethmalani had assured the court that he would produce what he claimed were the real contents of Wadia's website anjuna.com but he failed to do so even today. Only a brochure in this regard was produced. The website in the meanwhile has disappeared from the Internet.

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