Category: Popular Essays

Popular Essays

The Influence of Alito Siqueira

By ALBERTINA ALMEIDA

From the late 1980’s onwards, I have been involved in the struggle condemning tourism as it was foisted on the Goan people. Alito was involved at the time with a few others in the University in carrying out a study on tourism and its implications for the people of Goa.  While interviewing me, he asked: “Why should those working on the farms oppose tourism, given the measly wages they are paid by the landlords and the better income they get from tourism?” The question has stayed with me ever since. (more…)

Popular Essays

A Much-Needed Ferment

By AMITA KANEKAR

India, said The Economist famously some years ago, is a ‘continent-sized embarrassment’. The description, which attracted outrage from sections of India’s ruling establishment, is actually a mild one, if you go by the recently-published book ‘The Ferment: Youth Unrest in India’ (Macmillan, 2019) by Nikhila Henry. The book paints a picture of contemporary India that is at once both depressing and inspiring. Depressing because it relentlessly and meticulously confirms the suspicion that must haunt every thinking Indian today: this country is just not working. Henry’s book interviews diverse young people across the country united by their involvement in protests of one kind or another, trying to find out just why they are angry. And, from almost all the vantage points she presents, the country resembles less a functioning republic and democracy than a disaster zone; a disaster zone in which millions of the weakest, poorest, most vulnerable of its citizens are trapped in poverty, violence, hierarchy, patriarchy, illiteracy, criminalisation, you name it, most of it based on caste, and with no freedom in sight.

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Popular Essays

The DNA of Slavery

By DALE LUIS MENEZES

There are only a handful of novels in English that have been written by Goans or persons of Goan origin/ancestry. Margaret Mascarenhas’ Skin is one of them. This novel was first published around 10 years ago by Penguin. For the last few years I have come across sporadic references on the internet forums regarding Margaret’s novel and I always nursed a desire to read it. Last year when Goa1556 took the opportunity to republish it, I was of course thankful –the book was finally in my hands!

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Popular Essays

Delayed Rains are the Cost of ‘Development’

By DALE LUIS MENEZES

Water reserves are dangerously low owing to the delayed rains in most parts of the country; in some places, reservoirs are bone dry. Scientists express fears that in 3 or 4 decades, most Indian cities will be unlivable as they will run out of water. The delayed rains and the disruption of the seasonal cycles is another aspect of climate change, and it should be clear by now that such a change has dire consequences for the survival of life.

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Popular Essays

Of Big Daddies, Sugar Daddies, and Just Daddies

By ALBERTINA ALMEIDA

Of late, all kinds of ‘Daddies’ are in the news. I want to state here that I had a loving and caring father, who has been with me through all the times that I have endured. This caring did not mean pampering and he did not fail to reprimand when it was called for. I wouldn’t have exchanged him for anything in the world. He was a father who taught me the value of hard work and not to yield to any pressures. He would recount anecdotes with such gusto that even when he repeated them, one still listened as if to new stories. He wasn’t tall, dark and handsome. He didn’t flaunt his hairy chest. He and my mother cooked jointly. Not that he was without his faults, but this is an attempt to highlight certain positive traits that are not usually attributed to men. (more…)

Popular Essays

A Republic Always in Crisis

By DALE LUIS MENEZES

The Indian Republic is, was, and will be in crisis. And perhaps the biggest issue that dogs the Republic is social and economic inequality. Seventy years of electioneering has not solved the problem. Successive governments and civil society groups have failed to address the issue of inequality. The social and economic inequalities manifest in the form of routinized violence and discrimination in everyday life for the marginalized and minoritized communities. The crisis will only deepen in the future if these inequalities remain unaddressed. (more…)

Popular Essays

Ami asa, mhunn tumi asa: Of the Big Daddies who would rule us

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.

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