Category: Popular Essays

By AMITA KANEKAR

Chief Minister Pramod Sawant, in a recent public event, handed over letters offering government jobs to 42 ‘children of freedom fighters’, and announced that a further 90 more will be handed over by December 19, making a total of 132 of such job-offers in just these few months. These offers are the result of the reservation in government jobs for this group of people, part of the official policy of reservations for various sections of society. Within a few hours, however, at least one recipient announced his refusal of the offer, saying that he is comfortably off and does not need a government job. His statement was celebrated by a section of social media, implying that other beneficiaries of reservations (especially, one is sure, caste-based reservations) should learn from him. (more…)

By JASON KEITH FERNANDES

A few weeks ago, while dwaddling in the bye-lanes of social media I ran into an antique image of the streets of Lisbon decorated to celebrate a public festival. The caption indicated that this was an image of the celebration of the establishment of the Estado da Índia in Lisbon. The image had been shared from its original source by a group whose postings I follow and in this group the image was accompanied by a caustic observation “When the Portuguese had a memory”. (more…)

By ALBERTINA ALMEIDA

I was drawn to read the Louisiana Civil Code, when at the meetings of the Family Law Review Committee constituted by the Government of Goa to update and review the family laws in Goa, late Adv. Manohar Usgaonkar would often allude to it. What might this Code be? What significance did it have for Goa? (more…)

By AMITA KANEKAR

In Goa, the answer to the question would be: to facilitate the building-construction industry any which way possible, including allowing building on agricultural lands and coasts, killing every river for dredging sand, and planning to rebuild supposedly-destroyed temples of which it has no proof. Is there anything else? (more…)

By ALBERTINA ALMEIDA

At a time when divisive politics is taking root across the globe, simple ordinary women from the temple town of Manguexi in Ponda, Goa, India, have been leading the way in preventing these roots from taking hold. These women are refusing to be distracted by the trail being laid by divisive politics and are steadfastly focused on their goal against destructive development that will consume and destroy them. (more…)

By ALBERTINA ALMEIDA

As per the Goa Town and Country Planning Act, 1974, as amended to date, Planning and Development Authorities have to prepare an existing land use map for the planning areas under their jurisdiction. However, this provision is not implemented in letter and spirit. Further, there is no such corresponding requirement for those areas which are not declared as planning areas. In that for those areas which are not declared as planning areas, there is no provision to prepare an existing land use map and an outline development plan. It would be useful to have a land use map drawn up even for non-planning areas, because it can provide an useful baseline for planning. It can ensure that the uses that the land has been traditionally put to are duly documented and people’s uses of land are recognised. (more…)

By JASON KEITH FERNANDES

The Chief Minister, Pramod Sawant, has gathered enough ridicule for his statement that he wishes to rid Goa of all signs of Portuguese rule, but not enough. Indeed, he actually needs to be prosecuted for attempting to vitiate the state of law and order (or what remains of it) in otherwise peaceful Goa. (more…)

By AMITA KANEKAR

Chief Minister Pramod Sawant has been the butt of much derision after his statement that he wants to wipe out all signs of Portuguese rule in Goa. People have been asking just how he planned to wipe out everything from the staple diet of not just Goans but all Indians (consisting as it does of vegetables, condiments, and fruit introduced then), to his own wardrobe and a million other things, including, not least, Catholicism and Catholics as well. (more…)

By JASON KEITH FERNANDES

Decades ago, I immersed myself in Advaita philosophy, and ran into the term “neti neti”. The two words are rejections, emerging from the word na iti, not this. The Advaitic philosopher, or the practitioner, who seeks to know the nature of the divine, observes the things of this world, and rejects them, indicating that this is not it, until, having negated all things of this world, they eventually emerge at an understanding of the one thing that is divine. (more…)

By AMITA KANEKAR

The newspapers recently reported the case of a lady in Vasco who was attacked by street dogs while walking to her home; she suffered multiple bites and had to be hospitalized for a night. The news was shocking and also depressing, given that it was not the first such incident in Goa in recent years. Also because the fallout was already known: angry, ugly and irrational demands, in the media and social media, for an immediate end to the ‘stray menace’. The usual articles showed up – of the rising number of dog attacks (which revealed that serious attacks are actually very few, that rabies has been controlled in Goa, and that most dog-bites in general are by pet dogs to their own owners), and also of the increasing population of dogs on the streets. Here the tone varied from dismay and horror, both absolutely understandable, to – more often – fury and demands for a Final Solution, so to speak. (more…)