planned very well for tidal surges and appropriate drainage but that ageold wisdom has been ignored in the new real estate frenzy nature will have its say carzanzalem and colva besides many other places in goa will pay a high price for heedless concretization this happened to chennai where the cooum and adyar rivers canal were encroached upon and countless lakes ponds and drainage channels were built over as the city revved up the fourthlargest economy in india now floods have already wreaked permanent havoc the chennai metropolitan development authority is finally halting all existing construction activity pending a review goa has indias best educated population but few lessons are ever learned by its stubborn venal political and economic elite instead of preparing for a chennaitype calamity in the state chief minister laxmikant parsekar seeks relaxations of crz norms so that more illfated construction can be planted on the coast meanwhile the real estate industry has encroached everywhere lowlying fields vulnerable hillsides river banks all this leaves the state extremely vulnerable to an entirely predictable cataclysmic tragedy the arabian sea is churning with more cyclones than any time in recorded history in 1998 one killed 10000 in gujarat and just a few days ago yemen was hit by two successively including the strongest ever in the countrys history the sea is rising due to global warming the storms are intensifying chennai is submerged today but make no mistake it could be goa tomorrowthe writer is a wellpublished author and photographer