Survey by Goa govt is politically motivated, unwarranted : Congress

The state Congress has alleged that the three-day survey conducted by BJP-led government was "ill-planned, unwarranted and politically motivated".

"The survey which concluded today has left out 70 per cent of the Goan population with the data available making it clear that less than 4.5 lakh out of 15.5 lakh people were covered under this survey by 7000 plus government employees including teachers in last 3 days. Congress party and many orgsations had opposed such a survey that has no purpose during this emergency. The population of Goa is almost 15.5 Lakhs with around 60,000 migrant labourers residing all over Goa," GPCC President Girish Chodankar said in a press release.

"This entire exercise was conducted by Pramod Sawant on the advice of the core team of the BJP with the sole intention of collecting voters' data for the Assembly elections of 2022. The collected data of around 4,39,666 persons is now available with private agency compromising the privacy of citizens. There is scope for misuse of data for commercial purposes as the data can be sold to marketing compes. The data is also transferred to BJP headquarters at Panjim for electoral benefits of the party," he added.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister Pramod Sawant said that the sixth COVID-19 patient from Goa has recovered. Only one active case remains in Goa and no new cases have been reported after April 3, he added.

( With inputs from ANI )