Patto-Panaji convention centre to house Goa’s largest auditorium: CM

NT NETWORK

Panaji

The foundation stone for the Rs 90 crore mini-convention centre and development of Rua De Ourem creek at Patto-Panaji was laid by Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Friday in the presence of Deputy Chief Minister Manohar Ajgaonkar and Goa Tourism Development Corporation chairman Dayanand Sopte.

“The new mini convention centre will have Goa’s largest auditorium with a capacity of 1300 which is 400 more than the capacity of Kala academy’s auditorium,” Sawant said, while interacting with media persons.

He said that this new mini-convention centre will be managed by the Tourism Department and GTDC, while the proposed International Film Festival of India (IFFI) convention centre at Dona Paula will be under Entertainment Society of Goa and Department of Information and Publicity.

“Government is in the process of completing certain formalities for the IFFI convention centre project, it will be soon put on track,” Sawant said.

Chief Minister said that post-COVID pandemic, Goa will see bright days for tourism industry, adding, with the new ‘standard of procedure’ specifically for tourism, the state will do better comparatively to other states in the country.

Deputy Chief Minister Manohar Ajgaonkar, who is also the Tourism Minister, said that the state is awaiting guidelines from the Ministry of Home Affairs to resume tourism activities.  

GTDC chairman Dayanand Sopte informed that the mini convention centre is being constructed under the Swadesh Darshan Scheme on the land belonging to the Department of Tourism at Patto-Panaji, which will also have an exhibition hall of 1500 capacity and boardrooms have also been considered for development of Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibition (MICE) tourism in the state.

As per the details provided by the GTDC, the structure comprises of lower ground, ground floor, first floor, and second floor with a total built-up area of 13,965 square metre.

The consultants of the projects are M/s Fourth Dimension Architects Private Limited while the project has been awarded to M/s Venkata Rao Infra Projects Private Limited.

The lower ground floor is proposed for parking for around 122 four-wheelers and 52 two-wheelers and will also house services like security and other utilities.

The ground floor will accommodate the exhibition centre, restaurant, kitchen etc. The first and the second floor will house the auditorium with stage, green room etc. Provisions have also been made for escalators and firefighting system etc. The project is expected to be completed by December 2021.