A floating casino in the Indian state of Goa is disrupting life for many local residents who say the berthed vessel is threatening their safety.
For the last two months, Golden Globe Hotels Pvt Ltd has been operating Goa’s newest floating casino, the Big Daddy (Maharaja) Casino, which plies its trade on the Mandovi river but collects and deposits customers from a jetty in Goa’s capital Panaji.
This weekend, the Herald Goa reported that local residents were losing it over the fact that casino customers who queue up nightly waiting to board the casino are blocking a local footpath, forcing local residents to walk on the adjacent road during rush hour, leading to traffic jams and a few incidents in which cars have struck pedestrians.
The boat’s captain told the Herald that it wasn’t just gamblers blocking the path but passengers trying to board other cruise ships. The captain claimed the problem will persist until the Goa State Infrastructure Development Corporation (GSIDC) “completes the construction of terminal building.”
Local Mayor Vithal Chopdekar has vowed that gaming operations won’t be allowed to encroach onto public thoroughfares. Chopdekar has ordered the municipal engineer to inspect the situation and deliver a report, after which “necessary action will be followed.”
Goa’s six floating casinos are all living on borrowed time, as the state government has ordered them to shift their operations onto land by July 2020. One of the proposed options has the floating casinos being relocated to a proposed ‘entertainment zone’ near a local airport.
The floating casinos have been the source of numerous headaches for local politicians in recent years, and their reputation took another hit following this week’s release of a viral video of a physical altercation between Maharaja casino security and guests, including a female who gets knocked flat on her ass in the road (as buses gingerly inch by).
The video led State Congress spokesperson Siddhana Buyao to claim that “the casino industry has not just taken Panaji, but the whole of Goa to ransom. Their employees are brutally assaulting people on the streets and yet no police complaint is registered against casino operators for assault.”
However, Goa Police claim that while complaints were originally filed by both parties involved in the altercation, neither side opted to formally pursue charges against the other.
