By AMITA KANEKAR
The rise of the BJP owes a lot to Nehruvian intellectuals, though this is something that neither would like to accept, with both accusing the other being anti-national. The recent death of celebrated thespian Girish Karnad however brought this irony out to the fore again.
By AMITA KANEKAR
“Correa’s rise to renown was rapid, and at least partially thanks to the context of nation-building; he opened his office just eleven years after the British left, a time when Indian governments, both national and provincial, were busy in proving that the new republic was a serious, modern and historic enterprise. It couldn’t have hurt either that he hailed from a wealthy and influential family; architectural practice has always benefited from – perhaps even relied on – the right connections. He began with a bang, with plum institutional projects like Delhi’s Handloom Pavillion (1958), and the Gandhi Smarak Sangrahalaya at Ahmedabad (1958-63), along with many private residences. They showcased an ingenuity with space and form, and what would become signature concepts like open-to-sky space, the tube-house that funnels air, and the expansive oversailing roof.”
[Read the full text published in ITC Hotel’s Magazine, here.]
By AMITA KANEKAR
The above is what someone campaigning in the Panjim bye-elections said to a group of voters living next to the St. Inez creek, when they spoke up at the election meeting about how the creek had not been cleaned even though monsoon was around the corner, which usually means terrible floods engulfing the houses and their residents. Don’t complain, was the answer. You live here because of us; be grateful. But the people did not stop complaining, so the meeting ended with a lot of promises of action and improvements, none of which have been fulfilled till date.
Courtesy: Luis Dias, Navhind Times.
Of all the genres of novel-writing, I have the greatest respect for writers of historical fiction. It is a genre best left untouched before a vast amount of reading and research on the subject and the historical period has been accomplished. In addition, one also has to possess a good imagination to recreate an often-distant past, in some ways very different from ours, but also in terms of the human experience, not that different. (more…)
By AMITA KANEKAR
Goa, according to a 2018 study, has the highest number of road fatalities per capita among all states in India. But is Goa’s government – frantically building more roads, and widening old ones to monstrous proportions – concerned about this?
By AMITA KANEKAR
The other day, I overheard a Goan parent complaining about how caste-based reservations were responsible for her offspring not getting admission into the MBBS degree course. ‘All vote-bank politics,’ she declared. ‘These politicians need their votes, so merit has no place even in professional courses!’
By AMITA KANEKAR
This article is about the temple of one of the most widespread and important deities of Goan village society, which is also however almost invisible as well as unknown to many Goans. The deity is Maharingan, and the reason for the invisibilation is because Maharingan is a Mahar deity, and Mahars are a community that would be openly called ‘untouchable’ in the past. Today, although such terminology and behaviour are banned by law, they are still treated as outsiders in not just many Goan villages but also in urban Goa. And their temple is a witness of this unspoken but persisting discrimination.
By AMITA KANEKAR
Monkeys are taking over village roofs across Goa, from Pernem to Canacona. According to Rama Velip, environmentalist and anti-mining activist, this is just one of the ways his village of Colomb has changed over the last decade. Most of the paddy fields and coconut plantations were damaged by mining run-off. Water availability went down; with heavy pollution of the river and wells running dry, the winter paddy cultivation was stopped. Increasingly erratic and unseasonal weather changes routinely cause crop failures. On top of all this are unwanted visitors: hoards of monkeys, along with leopards, wild boar, and bison. In fact, with bison attacks becoming common in the talukas of Bicholim, Sattari and Sanguem, some villages have demanded a drastic change in the classification of Goa’s state animal from ‘protected’ to ‘vermin’, which would allow them to be killed.
By AMITA KANEKAR
The Dr B R Ambedkar Memorial Lecture Series this year saw both the distinguished speakers, Advocate Martin Macwan and Prof Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd, speak, among other things, of the same two issues in their speeches. One was about English-language education – a subject of burning debate in Goa – and second about the need to expand caste-based reservations – a subject which is like the proverbial elephant in the room, i.e. always ignored.
By AMITA KANEKAR
Hindu temples in the news means that election season is upon us. First there was the violence at Sabarimala in Kerala, following the Supreme Court judgement lifting the temple’s ban on the entry of women of menstruating age. In what Kerala’s BJP chief reportedly called a ‘golden opportunity’ for his party, women trying to enter the shrine were violently stopped by rampaging mobs. Meanwhile in the north, we see the sudden reiteration of the old Sangh Parivar demand for a Ram temple on the site of the demolished Babri Masjid. The demand was not surprisingly accompanied by the declaration that only Modi would build the temple, which is why he must be voted in again.