Exactly so, Rico.
Yesterday, I made it a point to visit Caurem along with Adv. Antonio Lobo,
to shake hands with the agitating women ( including Cheryl D'Souza) of
Aguada jail fame of the past and to congratulate them on their anti-mining
stand.
At Quepem, we were misdirected and in the bargain we landed up proceeding
to Curchorem-Sanguen instead of Caurem.
What we experienced has shocked us to our toes. Normal road traffic is not
possible with hundreds of laden truck proceeding towards Sanguem and empty
ones returning to the mines. Other vehicles must zoom in an out between the
trucks whenever opportunity is available.
This is not a traffic problem.
This is a human rights problem.
Ordinary life is paralysed totally and completely.
POOR THEM.
Being the core members of the GRA as well as of the GSRP, we feel that we
must do something terrible to avert human tragedy in this area.
Then we visited Maina in Caurem, the home to Cheryl D'Souza on a farm stead
of 240 acres nesting between beautiful green hills after shaking hands with
the motley group of women still on daily protests.
Cheryl poured out her life story to us, about how friends have turned foes,
how even spiritual leaders have turned their backs on this trio - the old
and ailing mother ( who is also of Aguada face), the woman with guts of
brass and her teenage school going girl who was forced to learn karate and
judo as part of her survival lessons. Their only safety is their ferocious
dogs.
A tour of the farm was invigorating. Cheryls hubby died of fence
electricution at the age of 35 something when they, according to her, had
just paid off the loans on this farm. Tony's body is cremated on the
grounds, she says, and that is my resolve not to sell this iron ore laden
( 60+ grade) estate which is in the eye of the Goa ministers, the Alemaos.
They want me to sell, she says. This will only happen over my dead body,
she shouts.
A hot cup of tea to go with the life story was what made us both more
patriotic than what we were. Cheryl is one hundered per cent GOAN and she is
ferrociously defending her rights to live a quiet peaceful life of hard work
and prosper. I don't want the multi crores that these punks are offering me.
They will get this land only over my dead dead body, she says.
Meantime, she showed us the vegetables she is growing besides the various
fruits including heavily laden mango tree grafts. My only problem is the
hordes of monkeys which are displaced from around the mining areas.
She markets her produncts at a distant Varca on every day basis which
includes mouth watering pickles.
We have taken her offer to spend a week- end with her on this sprawling
farm, the only place in God's heaven when the sorrounding is gone to dogs
(including the very road she has to travel on daily basis) with
indiscriminate mining going on. I have to change the tyres of my vehicles
every 2 to 3 months, she says.
The parting piece she tells us is that, 'IF I SELL, ALL 3 SIDES SURROUND MY
ESTATE ARE GOING TO EXPLODE INTO IRREVERSIBLE MINING THAT WILL BE THE END OF
GOA AND GOANS.
We have parted advising her to keep her guns loaded and to check the live
status of the bullets in the belts.
Cheers
floriano
goasuraj/GRA
9890470896
www.goasu-raj.org
----- Original Message -----
From: "Frederick Noronha" <fredericknoro...@gmail.com>
To: "Goa's premiere mailing list, estb. 1994!" <goanet@lists.goanet.org>
Sent: Thursday, May 05, 2011 5:34 AM
Subject: Re: [Goanet] WHOM WILL YOU HANG, MR CHIEF MINISTER?
Aires, What exactly is "illegal" mining? By focussing on "illegal
mining" (I counted the word seven times in your post) are you
suggesting that "legal mining" is not a problem in Goa?
While writing on the environment in the past (since the late 1980s) we
noticed that villagers in the hinterland were complaining about the
huge footprint mining as a whole left on their face. Its impact is
visible for all to see.
This "illegal mining" discourse is a recent addition, aimed at
deflecting attention from a wider problem. I think the Opposition too
has been playing this game; what is your stand on it? FN