Category: Popular Essays

Popular Essays

Responsibility and Goan Roads

By DALE LUIS MENEZES

 

Along with the rising temperature this summer, there has been a sharp increase in the deaths related to road accidents. The first half of 2016 produced some truly chilling statistics with the death toll for the month of January and February reaching 59 persons. April 2016 saw a staggering 11 deaths in just 5 days. While one may have heard, and received, cautionary advice at the beginning of the monsoon season owing to the slippery roads, perhaps we also need to caution each other at the start of every summer in a similar way. After all, the rising temperature seems to be making our roads, quite literally, hotbeds for fatal accidents.

 

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Popular Essays

Of Accidents, Masculinities and (absence of) Rule of Law

By ALBERTINA ALMEIDA

 

The spate of accidents in the last few days has triggered a discussion on both the causes and the solutions. Coming in the aftermath of the ban on bars and the vending of liquor within 220 or 500 metres from the national and state highways (as the case may be), it is perhaps a poignant reminder that we need to dig deeper into this malaise of accidents, rather than come up with knee jerk responses or solutions that provide the justification for surveillance while not addressing the core problems.

 

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Popular Essays

Coal and a bit of Colonialism

By DALE LUIS MENEZES

 

The decision by the state and central governments to expand the coal handling capacity of the Mormugao port is cause for alarm. From very real and obvious dangers of environment and health to the equally real threat to the livelihoods of traditional fishermen, the government seems least bothered about the citizens. On the contrary they are making haste to promote the interests of the big corporations. Indeed, plans to build the National Highway 17-B and the dredging of the Mormugao port are geared to facilitate the transport of large volumes of coal to industries in neighboring Karnataka.

 

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Popular Essays

What made ‘Goemkarponn’ so Manoeuvrable?

By ALBERTINA ALMEIDA

 

From the get go, there was no sign of Goem, Goemkar, Goemkarponn at all. Not even when the 2017 Goa Legislative Assembly election results were beginning to trickle in. One would have thought that small is beautiful and manageable and that the smallness of Goem affords a unique opportunity to better and more expeditiously manage.  But despite EVM machines as in other states, which should have seen the results pouring in rather than trickling in, Goa’s results took a longer time than those of UP with ten times the number of seats.  Indeed Goa’s counting in relation to that of the rest of India’s states that went to the polls was ajeeb (strange).

 

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Popular Essays

Racism: Theory and Practice

By AMITA KANEKAR

 

How can we forget Atithee devo bhava (the guest is god), that pillar of Indian culture? Such was the lament from some sections of the Indian media following the latest murderous attacks on Africans, this time in Noida and triggered by the death of a local teenager. Five Nigerian students in the neighbourhood were arrested after being accused by locals of everything from drugging the boy to eating him, following which mobs began to search for and beat up other Africans, grievously injuring four men who were cornered in a mall. Except for arresting the Nigerians on charges of murder (they were later released for lack of evidence), and thus adding credence to the wild rumours going around, the police did nothing.

 

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Popular Essays

The Ambiguous Aid of the Goan taxista

By JASON KEITH FERNANDES

Ever so often public ire in Goa turns against the Goan taxi-drivers who are seen, at least by certain dominant sections, as the single group that is upsetting the order in Goa. The taxistas, and in particular the taxistas of Salcete, have been accused of refusing to accede to a regime of digital meters and proper fare charts, charging exorbitant amounts in the absence of these standards. Additionally, if the clients ask for details of the fare calculation, they are allegedly often abused or threatened. These men are seen as uncouth, unreasonable, prone to violent protest.  A number of concerned voices were recently raised when the taxi drivers blocked the entry of the transportation network companies, like Uber and Ola, into the local market. These voices pointed out that such behaviour was in fact enforcing a monopoly, and thanks to the uncouth and violent behaviour of the taxistas would in fact result that a tourist’s first impression of Goa was a negative one. This could only result in the decline of tourists to Goa and the killing of one of the most lucrative industries that the state enjoys.

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Popular Essays

आंतोनियो कॉश्तांच्या माफीचे राजकारण

कौस्तुभ नाईक/KAUSTUBH NAIK

गोमंतकीय वंशाचे व पोर्तुगालचे सद्याचे पंतप्रधान आंतोनियो कॉश्ता हे गोवा भेटीवर असतानाचे निमित्त साधून साडेचारशे वर्षाच्या पोर्तुगीज राजवटीसाठी कॉश्ता ह्यांनी माफी मागावी अशी मागणी महाराष्ट्रवादी गोमंतक पक्षाचे नेते सुदिन ढवळीकर ह्यांनी केली आहे. ऐन निवडणुकीच्या तोंडावर आलेली ही मागणी आणि ढवळीकरांचे सनातनी हिंदुत्वप्रेम लक्षात घेतल्यास ह्या मागणीचा रोख नेमका कुठे आहे हे सुज्ञास सांगायची गरज नाही. पण अशा घोषणामागे गोव्याच्या वसाहतवादी इतिहासाचे एकसुरी चित्र रंगवून सामाजिक तेढ निर्माण करण्याचे प्रयत्न अधोरेखित केले पाहिजे.

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