GOA AND EUROPE: ON EMOTIONAL AND LEGAL BONDS

Two headlines in the last month are a good example of the irony at work in Goan politics. Following Portugal’s surprise win at the Euro 2016, one headline read: “Euro win unites Goa & Portugal” (12 July, 2016). The second headline a few days later read: “27,000 Goans with both Portuguese and Indian passports to be struck off poll rolls” (20 July, 2016). The first headline highlighted the emotional bonds between Goa and Portugal, with many of the comments by former Goan footballers emphasizing that the Portuguese football team had such a large support base here due to the “Portuguese rule” over different parts of Goa over a period of 451 years. The second headline drew our attention to the legal and diplomatic issue surrounding the vexed dual citizenship affair, and the current impossibility to hold both Portuguese and Indian citizenship at the same time.

If one were to look at the legal history, Portugal started recognizing certain tax-paying Goans as its citizens at least from 1826 when the Carta Constitutional was brought into force, reinforced further in 1910. The Salazarian Estado Novo despite its curbs on political organization did not restrict the right of citizenship of Goans. This was markedly different from what happened in neighboring British India where Britain refused to recognize even elite Indians as imperial citizens. It is interesting to note how following Portugal’s success on the football pitch, emotional ties are highlighted more by commentators than the legal ties, and when the question of legal issues emerge, the emotional ties are always kept out. It seems that the celebrations over football have nothing to do with this legal history that saw Goans first being recognized as Portuguese citizens, and after the Indian armed action, saw Goans reclaiming this right to work and engage with a larger European world.

To be fair, following or in the build-up to any big football match that Portugal plays, there are always reports that pour from the former ‘colonies’ about the support the football team receives and how it is the colonial history that provides this connect. However, parts of this colonial history which included the extension of citizenship to the colonies is not highlighted or willfully ignored. In Goa, the celebrations over such a victory additionally get hijacked by nationalism wherein rightwing groups declare that it is anti-national to cheer for the Portuguese football team. Thus, the history of colonial oppression is one that liberal as well as rightwing observers remember during such sporting events, as it is certainly odd to cheer a former colonizers’ football team in a post-colonial world. While the moderate or liberal commentators may marvel at the emotional display for the Portuguese team (in Goa as well as in other former colonies), the rightwing commentators would outright condemn it.

If the fascination with the emotional response to the Portuguese football team is marked by a selective memory of colonial history, the issue of dual citizenship is marked by a complete amnesia about the same. The legal history of the Portuguese citizenship of Goans is ignored and the issue is seen entirely through the lens of Indian cultural nationalism that seems to supersede everything. 

The rationale given to strike-off 27,000 Goans from the electoral rolls was that “as per the Representation of People’s Act and the Election Rules, one has to be an Indian citizen to cast one’s vote. Also, the concept of dual citizenship does not exist in the country [India]”. What such a statement does not account for is the fact that Indian laws were unilaterally imposed on Goa from 1961without any regard for the region’s history or without the assent of the inhabitants. With the normalization of diplomatic relations between Lisbon and New Delhi in 1975, Portugal gave the option to reclaim its citizenship to those who were residing in the former Portuguese India, as well as their children. Bearing in mind such a history, Jason Keith Fernandes, a legal anthropologist and Herald columnist argued that “if Goan migration seems to be turning into a one-way exit, it is because of the oppressive legal regime that the Indian state insists on. Goans are not obtaining Portuguese passports; they are merely reclaiming the Portuguese citizenship that they have always enjoyed… A legal regime honest about history would undoubtedly allow for a more dynamic movement of Goans between Goa and other places”.

 

In East Timor

The move to remove 27,000 Goans from the Indian electoral rolls also reeks of a sinister and short-sighted plan, especially since the assembly elections are round the corner. A demographic swing of 27,000 people who will not be able to vote either makes it easy for some or difficult for others in the forthcoming elections. Given that the legal question is not yet debated and settled properly, hasty moves such as deleting names off electoral rolls will further compromise Goan identity. Yet again the destiny of large number of Goans will be determined by some who are unwilling to safeguard those interests and dismissive of Goa’s legal history, making the mobility of Goans in and out of their own homeland difficult. Most probably the issue of allowing Goans to hold dual citizenship will remain unresolved as the issue would lose its political value after the elections, while liberal and rightwing commentators would continue to wonder why in Goa (as well as in other former Portuguese colonies) a football match can evoke such emotional responses.

It would perhaps not be out of place to say that the Goan support to the Portuguese football team emerges not only due to a shared colonial history, but also a legal history of equal citizenship embedded within the shared colonial history. Eder’s brilliant and fantastic 109th-minute strike should essentially remind us of this.

(First published in O Heraldo, dt: 3 August, 2016)

THE HYPOCRISY OF GOA’S PROTESTING AWARDEES

By JASON KEITH FERNANDES, DALE LUIS MENEZES, AMITA KANEKAR, VISHVESH KANDOLKAR, and KAUSTUBH NAIK

In the context of a number of Sahitya Akademi awardees across India returning their respective awards in protest against the growing intolerance in India, in Goa around fourteen Sahitya Akademi awardees together with Padmashri awardees Maria Aurora Couto and Amitav Ghosh came together and issued a joint statement on 15 October, 2015. One would be struck by the hypocrisy contained in their press note released were it not for the fact that their politics of intolerance is so blatantly displayed all over the same note.

In their statement these local notables condemn “the rising trend of intolerance in the country which threatens freedom of expression…[and] the age-old liberal and all-encompassing philosophical traditions of this country.” One would take this concern seriously were it not for the fact many of these notables have been complicit not only in acts of intolerance themselves, but also physical violence.

For some years now there have been demands from many quarters that Konkani literature written in the Roman script also be given governmental recognition. But Sahitya Akademi awardees like Pundalik Naik and N. Shivdas, who have presided over the Goa Konkani Academy, have not felt it necessary to take up this cause and ensure that a Konkani tradition with a longer history than that in the Nagari script one is recognised. On the contrary, all of these protesting SahityaAkademi awardees and Padmashri Couto have watched silently while Roman-scriptKonkani has been officially ignored and excluded from all kind of state recognition, including awards and grants.

In addition, these persons have maintained a studious silence while their associates, such as Uday Bhembre and Nagesh Karmali, have engaged in the most vicious hate speech against the Catholic community in the course of the Medium of Instruction controversy (that has raged from 2011), when Goan parents demanded the right to determine the manner in which their children are educated. Where was their concern for the alleged liberal traditions, and traditional bonhomie, of Goa then?

To make matters worse, these same notables watched silently when in 2005 Naguesh Karmali, a member of this verygroup of protestors, led a violent mob in destroying public and private property on the grounds that such property was encouraging Portuguese (read as Catholic) culture in Goa.Given that Goa has had a long and historical relationship with Portugal, doesn’t the violent smashing of manifestations of this relationship amount to an act of the very same rabid communalism that these worthies profess to protest against?

In light of these inconsistencies, and the equally amusing announcement that they will hold on to their awards until the meeting of the executive committee of the Sahitya Akademi, it appears that these awardees seem more interested on jumping onto the bandwagon of political trendiness, than for any desire to stand against the growing intolerance in the country, and indeed, Goa itself.

We would like to stress that while it is true that the government of Mr. Modi has definitely presided over a rise in intolerance in the country, the roots of this intolerance lie deeper in the country’s history. As we have already pointed out, a number, if not all, of these Goan awardees are complicit in this intolerance. Their complicity is further evident in the manner in which they phrase their protest within the language of Hindutva. Why, for example, are the recent acts compared to ‘talibanism’, instead of calling them Hindutva, or Hindu nationalism? Talibanism is a phenomenon situated outside the country, when Hindutva is the problem actually at hand, given that Kalbargi, Pansare and Dabholkar lost their lives as a result of their opposition to this ideology. Indeed, Hindu nationalism has been a problem since before Indian independence. In referencing the Taliban, these awardees continue the refusal to recognize Hindu nationalism as the single greatest cause of concern in this country since 1947.

In conclusion, we would be more convinced of the genuine concerns of these state awardees from Goa if we heard them also protest the exclusion of Konkani in the Roman script from legislative recognition, also the violent condemnation of the Goans who are simply asking for English as a state-supported medium of instruction for their children, and also the lack of implementation of constitutional guarantees for education and jobs to historically discriminated-against Goan communities. Such protests would go further in establishing norms for the respect of fundamental rights, and the establishment of law and order in our state and country.

(First published in DNAIndia (Web) on 23 October, 2015)

‘ESCAPING’ TO GOA

The urban Indians, especially those privileged by caste and class, are at it again. The Condé Nast Traveller India last month carried a two-part article by Revati Upadhya on “How to move to Goa”. While Upadhya’s article is ostensibly about how urban Indians, tired of the rat-race and the hamster-wheel of metropolitan India, can leave it all for the quiet and peaceful life in Goa, what is unmistakable is the trope of ‘escape’ in her article. She says, “Like us, a range of professionals from across India are escaping [emphasis mine] big city shackles only to discover that setting a life in Goa isn’t tough and finding livelihood isn’t much of a bother”.

Not so long ago, Vishvesh Kandolkar, a professor at the Goa College of Architecture, made an astute comment on the changing trends of the real estate market in Goa. He observed that “one should be aware that the large, elite, property sharks from the Indian metros, ably aided by the local real estate industry, are taking bigger bites of [Goa], and that too as a second, or a third, helping, in their insatiable lust for property ownership and leisure”. Obviously, large chunks of Goan land gobbled up by real estate sharks is a real crisis. However, it is not always a simple and clear-cut case. Also part of the problem is the manner in which Goa is viewed in metropolitan India. Thus, the key to the problem lies in identifying that the desire of elite Indians for a piece of Goan land, and lifestyle for their consumption, is an exercise of their privilege, as well as demonstrating how Goa is constructed as a veritable touristic paradise.

Upadhya must be talking of a different Goa from the one inhabited by most local Goans, for if finding livelihood in Goa is not much of a problem, then why are so many Goans migrating out? In the face of this confusion, one might ask why Goa is the most favored destination for privileged urban Indians like Upadhya. Part of the answer lies in the manner in which Goa was created and projected as a site of tourism and pleasure. A deeper understanding of the issue is provided in Paul Routledge’s essay ‘Consuming Goa: Tourist Site as Dispensable Space’ (2000). In this essay Routledge argues that as a site of tourism and pleasure Goa was created “to serve as one of world’s pleasure peripheries, a cultural space for the leisure consumption of tourists divorced from the needs and concerns of everyday life”. The trope of ‘escape’ or ‘going away’ was also important for Routledge as he quite rightly argued that tourists ‘went away’ from their own lives, their cultural and economic milieu to a “timeless, workless paradise” (p. 2652).

To be fair to Upadhya, the main thrust of her article is also about finding suitable working options from Goa, despite hiccups like bad internet connectivity. But the idea that she is ‘escaping’ from a metropolitan city into peace and serenity – to a “timeless, workless paradise” – is very much present. In her own words, “Much as I love my trips back home to Bengaluru [Bangalore], it is landing back in Goa that makes me feel at peace again. As I exit the airport and drive down the tree-lined highway back to Dona Paula, I feel my breathing slow down again. Yes, I’ve come back to slower [i]nternet speeds, nonexistent public transport and close to no home-delivery, but I’ve come home”.  

By Angela Ferrao

The argument that needs to be made here is that older ideas of Goa being a pleasure-periphery are still in circulation and combine with the contemporary privileges of urban Indians. Note, for example, Udpadhya’s unconscious echoing of the hippy construction of Goa as a location of peace. If at all Upadhya and others find Goa as an amenable destination, it is because Goa is a pleasure-periphery for India and not in spite of it. What such ‘moving-to-Goa’ views hide is the fact that for most of urban Indians a move to Goa is a way up in one’s career, a move that signals that one has arrived in life – professionally and personally.

Secondly, as many commentators like Richa Narvekar, Vishvesh Kandolkar, Jason Keith Feranandes, and this writer have noted in the not so distant past, it is precisely such a desire of Indian and global elites for a piece of Goan lifestyle which is creating conditions that are making Goan real estate unaffordable for the average Goan. Let alone the fact that land as a resource is terribly scarce in Goa.

Lest this be solely seen as an argument for Goa for Goans, a response that is often used to shut down valid questions about the exercise of elite privileges, let me hasten to add that my intention is to suggest caution in the way we engage with Goa and Goans. My intention is to highlight how privilege works in multiple ways in compounding Goa’s problems. Like Vishvesh Kandolkar, I too would like to reiterate that the problem lies with the elite, both local and external, who use Goa for their leisure-consumption, even though they might tell you how difficult their life is, whether in their respective metros, or in Goa. The cost of such leisure-consumption has to be borne by the mass of Goans for whom living in Goa is becoming increasingly difficult. Moreover to sustain the leisure lifestyle of the elites there comes along many laboring-class ‘migrants’ competing with the poorer Goans to earn their livelihood. Thus, local Goans are hit with an economic double whammy, one from the ‘elite migrants’ and subsequently by their supporting laboring-class ‘migrants’. Idealizing Goa but for its bad internet and transportation is to do disservice to Goa and the migrant labour-class who deserve better.

Idealizing Goa will not help, talking about power and privilege operating in Goa will.

Many thanks to Angela Ferrao for permitting me to use her illustration.

(First published in O Heraldo, dt: 14 October, 2015)

THE SHAME OF SPEAKING KONKANI – II

The writing of a second installment to my article ‘The Shame of Speaking Konkani’ (published a fortnight ago), is partly for emphasizing the problem at hand and partly fortuitous.  I say fortuitous because, in response to my article, Damodar K Kamat Ghanekar wrote a letter to the editor (4 September, 2015) and had a rather interesting anecdote to narrate in the same. The manner in which the abovementioned anecdote is narrated further allows us to see how shame and humiliation operates within Konkani language politics.

Recounting an incident which happened some 40 years ago, Ghanekar mentions how he came across Alfred Rose and his wife conversing in English in Panjim. When Ghanekar inquired whether it was really Alfred Rose, he indicates that Alfred Rose became painfully uncomfortable so much so that one could “well imagine the contortions of embarrassment [emphasis mine] on his face [Alfred Rose] which I [Ghanekar] still remember”.

There is something deeply unsettling about recounting a person’s embarrassment in a public place with such gleeful abundance. In Ghanekar’s telling, Alfred Rose not only appears to be a deeply shamed person but also a hypocrite. However, there is nothing hypocritical in what Alfred Rose did. In fact, as I have pointed out time and again it is quite normal for persons to use two or more languages to negotiate through their daily life. So why did Alfred Rose feel so embarrassed by the encounter with Ghanekar?

Unfortunately, I do not have an exact answer to this. This is because as students of history well know, we are confronted with only one side of the story. And, as we are aware, it is often the victor who recounts the story. Further, rather than being embarrassed about speaking in Konkani, Alfred Rose was allegedly embarrassed for speaking in English. It is highly unlikely that Alfred Rose’s English skills were the source of his embarrassment; surely his English was as good as his Konkani!

Presumably, Ghanekar approached Alfred Rose in Konkani, for if it was in English than we would not have had any problem. My suggestion here is that Ghanekar was using an Antruzi variant of Konkani and this, I believe, is the key to the source of the embarrassment. The problem is that the Antruzi boli, located within an upper caste location and politics, is the source of much shaming and humiliation to anyone who fails to adequately reproduce the speech and ways of being of this dialect. The failure to live up to the Antruzi dialect does not simply cause embarrassment, but also causes much pain and anguish – resulting in the silence of many in Goa.

Such a situation has been noted by some other writers as well. For instance, an anecdote recounted by Jason Keith Fernandes in his doctoral thesis seems to be apt in understanding the embarrassment (or silence) that Alfred Rose experienced. Fernandes recounts, “In the course of our conversations [with a priest] around Konkani, this priest indicated a strong friendship he enjoyed with a Hindu gentleman. At one point however, the priest recounted that he was reproached by his friend: ‘Why is it that you never speak to me in Konkani’ the friend asked. To this question the priest responded that he felt ashamed, since his friend’s Konkani was so perfect, so pure, whereas his own was the ‘impure’ version that the Catholics speak”. At the risk of stretching the anecdote that Ghanekar provides ad absurdum, I would like to suggest that Alfred Rose was doubly trapped as the language politics that Alfred Rose subscribed to privileged only Konkani, and being called out for speaking in English by a person speaking Antruzi Konkani meant that there was no hope for redemption!

And what are we to make of the abundant glee with which Ghanekar recounts a 40-year-old anecdote of sarcastically indicating to Alfred Rose that he should do as he preaches? The clever way in which Ghanekar slipped a line from Alfred Rose’s song in the conversation – “Tika [Konkani] shellant heddun menn diunk zai” – is another way in which the shame of speaking Konkani is perpetuated. While Ghanekar’s encounter with Alfred Rose had resulted in “contortions of embarrassment” 40 years ago, the recounting of the same in the columns of a newspaper without any sensitivity or understanding has surely contorted many a Goan face with embarrassment today.

It is not surprising that in trying to prove the hypocrisy of Alfred Rose, Ghanekar reinforces a similar diktat that Alfred Rose does in his song Anv Konkani Zannam – to restore the pride in Konkani. Though Alfred Rose actively propagated some key tenets of the Nagri/Antruzi politics, he seems to have not escaped the shaming due to Konkani. After all, didn’t he say that we should feel proud about Konkani?

To reiterate, I strongly believe that Alfred Rose was not being hypocritical. On the contrary he was a product of his times as well as a victim of it. But to think that Alfred Rose was merely embarrassed for being ‘caught’ speaking in English is to not recognize the pain and suffering behind the “contortions of embarrassment”. By denying the real pain and suffering we perpetuate the shame and humiliation. As a linguist/lexicographer of Nagri Konkani, Ghanekar at least ought to have known this. 

(First published in O Heraldo, dt: 16 September, 2015)