When the state government in Goa drew up plans to make the Mormugao Port a hub for importing coal and transporting it to steel factories in Karnataka, it ran into opposition it had never really expected. At the public hearings on the proposal, doctors, lawyers and scientists tore into officials with information and questions for which they had no real answers.
The high-decibel public hearings made headlines. But far from the spotlight, ordinary, less-articulate Goan villagers in gram sabha meetings had already expressed their opposition to the coal hub plan. Transportation of coal had caused serious. . .
