Goa, Oct. 17 -- The Mormugao Port Authority (MPA) on Friday withdrew its Expression of Interest (EoI) to lease around one kilometre of Baina beach for commercial water sports activities for 30 years, backing down amid mounting opposition from political parties, fishing community represent atives and civic groups over the proposed com mercialisation of a public shoreline.

The withdrawal fol lowed warnings that the move could restrict pub lic access, threaten tradi tional fishing livelihoods and hand a stretch of the coastline to commer cial interests for three decades. The MPA, how ever, offered no expla nation for withdrawing the EoI. A corrigendum issued by the MPA's Engineering Civil Department con firmed that the e-tender cum-e-auctio...