The Coastal Regulation Zone Act, passed by a socialist Parliament in Nude Elly, a city over 2000 miles from any beach, effectively hands over ownership of every Indian beach to our The State. With this Act, passed on "environmental" grounds, building and construction 500m from the tideline have become "State business" - not the business of the respective Property owners. Like all socialist legislation, this too is violative of Private Property.
Where I live in South Goa, the CRZ Act has meant that poor people who "own" traditional cottages on the shore cannot obtain the Capital value of their properties. Shacks on the beach are allotted annually through auctions - and the structures allowed to be built are by force "temporary." According to this article I just found in Tehelka, the Goa hotel industry is suffering because of all the bureaucracy and red-tape "empowered" by this Act.
The first question to ask is: Who owns the Property on the beach?
The second question is: How can the coastline be "protected" from environmental damage? The waves of the ocean cause constant erosion - and nothing can stop that. Because of erosion there is sand - and the rocks on the shoreline are rounded and smooth. What is so horrible about buildings on the shore - like Mumbai's Marine Drive?
This "environmental protection" on the part of our The State is nothing but a new kind of "permit raj" purporting to serve some "public interest." Note that the "environmental permit" has been enthusiastically granted to a huge nuclear power plant bang on the Konkan Coast, just miles north of Goa. Meanwhile, away from the coast, in all the verdant hills of the Western Ghats that are "unowned" - and hence State property by default - the red mud of iron ore is being dug out and exported. And if someone wants to build a casino atop a hill he is being told that his casino can only be established aboard a ship floating on the sea!
Property is the "name of the game" called Capitalism.
Socialism - the very anti-thesis of Property - is nothing but "legal plunder." It seeks to loot the property owner, not protect him.
We in India must choose between these two ideologies.
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