MSSG - MOVEMENT FOR SPECIAL STATUS FOR GOA
Cordially invites you to attend this unique SYMPOSIUM [ North-Goa], the
programme of which is as follows:-
Speakers: (Executive Members of MSSG):
Adv. Antonio Lobo[Convener]; Prof. Prajal Sakardande; Prof. Sergio Carvalho
Anthony Alvares.
(Invitees):
Mr. Reginaldo Lourence, Hon. MLA from Curtorim; Adv. Amrut
Kansar, Ex-MP ;
Adv. Radharao Gracias, Ex-MLA; Mr. Damu Naik-Ex-MLA;
Mr.Rajendra Kakodkar;
Mr. Dillip Hegde.
Special Invitees who couldn't attend:
Rev. Fr. Eremito Rebello; Mr. Shantaram Naik, MP; Mr. Shripad Naik,
MP,
Mr. Francisco Sardinha, MP; Mr. Rohan Kaunte, MLA Porvrim.
3. Each speaker shall speak for 5 minutes, briefly but effectively, to
present their views on the subject of attaining Special Status for Goa
[Special Provisions under
amended Article 371of the Constitution of India].
4. After every 3 Speakers, there shall be a interactive session of 15
minutes between the Speakers and the members of the esteemed Audience so
that points made
in the speeches may be clarified or expanded to the satisfaction of
those who want clarification/s and/or expansion.
5. Three Resolutions shall be passed and adopted after the end of the above
session of Speeches and Interactions after having been read in English
Language and
Explained in Konkani.
6. A vote of thanks by: Ms. Annabelle Pereira; member, MSSG.
The Symposium shall start in earnest after refreshments have been served
between 09.00 and 09.30 hours. After the dignitaries are welcomed and
invited to take their respective seats on the dais, a short ceremony of
'Garlanding' the Portrait of the Father of Goa's Opinion Poll - Dr. Jack De
Sequeira by Dr. N.S. Dumo and Ms. Manuela Lobo shall take place to the
accompaniment of the CD song composed by Sigmund D'Souza to honour Dr.
Jack De Sequeira.
The Compare for the day shall be Mr. Floriano Lobo, member, MSSG.
A REPORT
The Symposium started at 10.00 hours after refreshments were served in the
lobby of the hall. The ceremony of 'GARLANDING' the portrait of Dr. Jack De
Sequeira by Dr. N.S. Dumo, President of GSRP to represent the Older
Generation and Ms. Manuela Lobo to represent the Younger Generations of
Goans followed. Later the CD of the song composed by Sigmund D'Souza, a
member of MSSG, was played over the Hall's creditable sound system with
Sigmund D'Souza giving a short explanation over the composition.
The Speakers were welcomed by gifting a small bouquet of flowers by Ms.
Manuela Lobo who were then escorted to the dais.
The Speakers [in the order of their turns]
Prof. Sergio-bab Carvalho: Delivered a rather effective picture of how
Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru lied and cheated Goans. His delivery was loudly
applauded
Floriano Lobo while thanking Prof. Carvalho for his excellent delivery, said
that Goa required not one Special Status but several in a chain. He
re-counted his experience this morning when he went to the Mapusa Municipal
Market to purchase flowers and garlands for the meeting. That at 0730 hours
while all the hawkers and shops were slowly coming alive, the pile of
yesterday's garbage was on the roads as huge mounds with no sweepers or
garbage clearing trucks in sight. He said that the Indian Constitution needs
another altogether new Article to be added to it to cancel the office
timings for the municipal cleaners/sweepers from existing Ten to Five to
Midnight to Four A.M. so that all our city markets and streets are swept
clean before the early 'crow' is ready for his breakfast. He also said that
he wants to start a business of robbing people's houses and selling the
goods in the special market place by employing a large platoon of robbers
and thieves. If the police should catch them, with the existing trend set up
by the government, he could claim that these people are robbing dependent
people and therefore the tax-payers should support them, in a clear bid to
tell the Honourable CM that what he is doing with the mining dependent
people is wrong.
Rajan-bab Kakodkar: Told the stunned audience that the mounds of ore-reject
are worth at least 2 billions of U.S. Dollars, calculated in Indian Rupees
amounting to rupees thousands of lakhs crores , that each Goan, considering
Goa's population as 12 to 14 lakhs, is worth a crore of rupees a piece. That
each Goan family, considering that there are 7.5 lakh families, should get
Rs. 50 thousand a piece per month.
Floriano Lobo, commenting on the speech said that the 50 thousand rupees
could be distributed with Rs. 10,000/- per family per month, pay off the
crippling public debts with another Rs.10,000/- per family a month and spend
the rest Rs. 30,000/- to install excellent all round infrastructure so that
Development takes place on its own, reversing what is presently happening
and has been happening i.e. development first, then think of infrastructure.
A perfect example is the Patto Plaza area in Panjim where infrastructure is
still happening but the Development has already taken place.
Anthony-bab Alvares - Delivered a historical background why Goa has been
neglected and left to deteriorate despite heavy promises by Pandit
Jawaharlal Nehru.
Floriano Lobo while commenting on the speech said that President John F.
Kennedy was a good friend of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru who saved him during
the Chinese aggression in 1962 by air-dropping arms and ammunition,
including the tanks, overnight from neighbouring then Formosa, now South
Korea. He reminded the audience that Kennedy, in his wisdom, had also
taunted Nehru after he invaded Goa for having given the world lessons in
MORALITY and NON- VIOLENCE when he himself was caught coming out of a
brothel.
Dillip-bab Hegde: Entertained the audience with his witty delivery and
warned GOANs that they must leave their SUCEGAD-NESS aside for once when
they are being dragged by their feet into extinction. He touched upon the
recent declaration of the Government of Goa that 40 lakh settlers are
planned for Goa in the next 25 years. This must stop. he said, if GOANs do
not want to be extinct from GOA. He talked of the Bandodkar Regime and the
ill-founded merger of Goa into Maharashtra.
Floriano Lobo while thanking him for his entertaining delivery and for
buoying the spirits of the audience from the dooms-day cloud hanging over
their heads, told the audience that Bandodkar was heard speaking at a public
meeting thus, when he was asked as to "WHAT WERE THE AIMS OF FORMING THE
'MAHARASHTRAWADI GOMANTAK PARTY". His answer was " THERE IS NO AIM BAIM.
OUR MISSION IS TO BUNDLE GOA ( LIKE A PIG ON THE POLE) INTO MAHARASHTRA-
THAT MGP HAS NO COMPETENCE TO GOVERN GOA"
Radharao-bab Gracias: Showed up rather late in time, blamed Goans for being
SUCEGAD. He touched upon how East-Timor has fought for its independence much
after the occupation of Goa by India. He said Adv. Anton-bab Lobo, the
convenor of MSSG looks a replica of SHANANA GUSMAO, the person who fought
for the Independence of East-Timor and now it's President and wished that
Goa's Shanana Gusmao would really stand up for GOA w.r.t. the obtaining of
the Special Provisions under amendment to the Article 371-I of the Indian
Constitution, if not for complete independence for Goa. He touched upon
various points of Goan sucegad-ness and easy-going attitude. He pointed out
that if Goans were conscious of what is happening to was bad and
intolerable, this hall would have overflowed. When he talked of Matanhy
Saldanha, he said that Matanhy's Goan-ness had taken a beating in recent
years when he had publicly said that those in Goa are not Goans but the
people of GOA, that people of Goa demanded this and the people of Goa
demanded that. He said that Goans are bonafide Goans of Goan ancestry and
the so called 'people of Goa' were outsiders settled or residing in Goa. He
further said that Floriano Lobo will endorse what he was saying because
Floriano was present when Matanhy had said the above.
Floriano Lobo, while thanking Radharao-bab Gracias for his excellent
delivery, informed the audience that he was indeed present when Matanhy had
said the above. He then went on to recount how E-Timor'eans drove out the
mighty Indonesia from their land with the support of the UN and the
western countries. That massive demonstrations took place in far away
Australia to protest the take-over of E-Timor by Indonesia. These collage of
photographs of these massive demonstrations in Australia which were flashed
to all corners of the world , changed the opinion of the UN and the World at
large and asked Indonesia to end its occupation of East-Timor. He hoped that
Goa will follow suit, even if it is half a century that GOANS have been
slumbering, that Goa's Shanana Gusmao will make it happen if India failed to
listen to the pleas of Goans for the Special Status under Article 371-I. of
the Constitution of India. In that case, he said, Goans will have no
alternative but to approach the United Nations, whose doors are still open
for Goa and Goans. That India should not test the patience of Goans anymore
because they do not want to be squeezed and pushed out of Goa any more.
Adv. Antonio-bab Lobo: His was a well compiled and excellently delivered
Speech. To Adv Radharao-bab's calling him Goa's Shanana Gusmao, he admitted
that at least one person has stopped him in Lisbon to ask him if he was not
Shanana Gusmao. He showed the audience the Herald Newspaper where it was
mentioned that 40 lakh settlers are planned for Goa for the next 25 years,
therefore the MEGA PROJECTS, MOPA Airport et al. To a demand from various
speakers from the audience in the interaction session that Goans cannot
afford to go to sleep any more and must show Delhi that they too can come on
the streets and match the violence that is common place in the rest of
India, he said that by the very fact that Goans are reluctant to resort to
violence and mob-mentality, it shows that they are different, tolerant,
educated and sensible. That they want to achieve what they want through
peaceful negotiations. That this is the basic ETHOS of GOANS, their
tolerance, their patience which sets them apart from the rest of INDIA. That
Goans will have to stick to these values and ETHOS and not go about
bringing themselves to the level of 'indiscipline mobs' we have in the rest
of India. This is our GOAN culture, makes, he said, Goans, a different
people. That the Portuguese were foolish, especially Mario Soares, when they
signed the Co-operation Treaty with India in 1974 without taking Goans into
confidence, he said. If they had, he said, Goans would have asked the
Portuguese to proceed with the Co-operation Treaty but with a 'RIDER', that
Goa must have the Special Provisions under Article 371-I as is given to
Nagaland, Misoram etc. Purshottam Kakodkar, he said, wanted autonomy for Goa
in 1961. But he was considered as a TRAITOR, by the rest of the so called
Freedom Fighters [Azad Gomantak Dal] who were on the payroll of India. If
Goans have been liberated, why are they leaving Goa's shores in droves with
Portuguese Passports? he asked. If they could find the jobs that they are
qualified to do, with deserving pay to go along with it, they would have
stayed back home.., he said. He said that there are more Goans in Swindon,
Toronto etc than we find Goans in our Goan villages. It is the agenda of
India as well as our successive governments in Goa to harass them so that
they flee Goa and leave it to the outsiders who pay handsomely for Goan
jobs. Therefore, how can the corruption be curbed? He asked. If they pay
large amounts of money for the jobs, they have to recover their investment.
Therefore Goans have to pay the bribes.
Floriano Lobo, while commenting and putting the house for interaction,
welcomed GOA'S SHANANA GUSMAO and wished him power to his foot so that he
can kick like Shanana Gusmao of E-Timor hard kick to the oppressors of
Goans.
Adv. Antonio-bab Lobo had started his speech by reading the abstracts of the
speech that Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru had made in BOMBAY in 1956 which is as
under:
"If the people of Goa, that is minus the Portuguese government - if and
when the Portuguese go and the people of Goa deliberately wish to retain
their separate identity - I am not going to bring them by force or
compulsion or coercion into the Indian Union. I merely say that my national
interest involves the removal of the Portuguese from Goa, not coercion being
used in bringing about the union of Goa with India, although I wish it, I
desire it and it is the only solution. That is a matter ultimately for the
people of Goa to decide. I want to make it perfectly clear that I have no
desire to coerce Goa to join India against the wishes of the people of Goa.
But the point is that we feel that Goa's individuality should remain and
that whenever the time comes for any changes, internal or other, it will be
for the people of Goa acting freely to decide upon them".
http://www.goanspirit.com/index.php/lead/246-goa-s-valid-claim
In the "Interactive Session" that followed, many members of the audience
spoke, among them Adv. Yoguesh Gaitonde, Sudeep Dalvi, Damodar Ghanekar,
Matias Vaz, Jose Maria Miranda, Ms. Fernandes from Calangute, Adv. Ryan
Menezes, Rui Da Gama and a few others, all of them very much concerned that
Goa was going down, down, down and that something must be done.
Ms. Fernandes contested what Floriano Lobo had earlier said ' that by
denying the much needed Plebiscite mandated under the UN Charter, India, in
1962, through the proclamation of extending Indian Citizenship on Goans, had
forced Indian Citizenship down their throats, which citizenship they did not
ask for, and maintained that he is a GOAN and nothing but A GOAN. If India
wanted him to take up Indian Citizenship, then India should give him the
opportunity to ask for it, through the promised PLEBISCITE. He said that the
Opinion Poll of 1967 was not the PLEBISCITE. When Ms. Fernandes further
asked a question as to how Goans can forget what India has done to liberate
Goa, Floriano Lobo retorted by saying that "GOA WAS COLONIZED BY THE
PORTUGUESE FOR 450 YEARS. THAT INDIA DROVE AWAY THE PORTUGUESE LIKE DOGS
WITH THEIR TAILS BETWEEN THEIR LEGS, IN A HUMILIATING MANNER PROMPTING THEM
TO COME A'BEGGING TO SIGN THE CO-OPERATION TREATY WITH INDIA WITHOUT
CONSULTING GOANS, THAT A FOREIGN COLONIZER WAS REPLACED BY ANOTHER WORST
COLONISER WHO WAS HELL BENT ON DESTROYING THE GOANNESS OF GOANS WHICH THE
FOREIGN COLONIZERS NEVER ATTEMPTED DOING.
The interactive session was cut short due to paucity of time as the Hall
Management was eager to re-possess the Hall for a fresh function.
Three Resolutions were passed, read by Ms/Adv. Tonia Lobo which were
proposed by Adv. Radharao Gracias and Seconded by Damodar Ghanekar, passed,
sealed and Delivered. The 3 Resolutions are as under:
MSSG - MOVEMENT FOR SPECIAL [PROVISIONS STATUS FOR GOA
SYMPOSIUM
14th. APRIL 2013
Menezes Braganza Hall-Panjim-GOA.
RESOLUTIONS:
RESOLUTION NO. 1
It has been resolved that the Chief Minister of GOA, Manohar-bab Parrikar
along with all the Legislators of the Goa Legislative Assembly passes a
RESOLUTION at the earliest that the Parliament amends Article 371-I of the
Constitution of India to grant SPECIAL [PROVISIONS] STATUS to GOA in order
that Goa may protect it's CULTURE, it's ETHOS, it's IDENTITY and it's
DEMOGRAPHIC BALANCE.
Preamble/Explanation:
Given the fact that the Political Party/s in Power in Goa have not, up to
this day, moved any motion to pass a RESOLUTION to the effect that GOA be
granted SPECIAL [PROVISIONS] STATUS under Article 371-I, this gathering of
people of Goa is passing the following Resolution:-
RESOLUTION NO. 2
It has been resolved that MLA of Curtorim Reginaldo-bab Lourenco or any
other Legislator, be asked to put forward a motion in the Goa Legislative
Assembly to pass a RESOLUTION to the effect that the Parliament amends
Article 371-I of the Constitution of India to grant SPECIAL [PROVISION]
STATUS to GOA in order that Goa may protect it's CULTURE, it's ETHOS, it's
IDENTITY and it's DEMOGRAPHIC BALANCE.
RESOLUTION NO. 3
It has been resolved that all three members of the Parliament from GOA are
hereby urged to use their good offices at all levels to gather sufficient
support for the appropriate amendment to the Article 371-I of the
Constitution of India to grant SPECIAL [PROVISIONS] STATUS for GOA
Proposed by: Sd/ Adv. Radharao Gracias
Seconded by: Sd/- Damodar Ghanekar
PASSED - SIGNED-SEALED & DELIVERED on this 14th day of April, 2013.
Ms. Annabelle Pereira: In her brief speech giving the Vote of Thanks, raised
the issue of IT Habitat for Goa to absorb young IT talent who are going to
other places like Mumbai, Bangalore and elsewhere. She said that this was a
dream of late NASCOM CEO DEVANG MEHTA for GOA, who she had met while she
was posted at Delhi as the CEO of the British Airways and working in Delhi
for 16 years before retiring in Goa.
Floriano Lobo while thanking one and all, closed the SYMPOSIUM for the day
with a promise of re-visiting with similar Seminars and Symposiums until
each and every Goan was aware of what they are missing.
THE END.
PS1: The names of the Speakers/Invitees which do not appear in the REPORT
were not present having had some personal problem/s or the other for gracing
the occasion.
PS2: Prof. Sergio Carvalho and Floriano Lobo were wearing the yellow
T-Shirts with this logo:
{FRONT]
I LOVE MY GOA
'NO' TO MOPA
'YES' TO DR. JACK DE SEQUEIRA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT DABOLIM GOA.
NAVY GET OUT
[BACK- IN LARGE AND BOLD LETTERS]
SAY
NO TO MOPA
NAVY GET OUT
These T-Shirts were available for sale at the basic cost price of Rs. 150/-
per piece.
43 T-shirts were pick-up by the audience members.
