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Visit http://www.garcabranca.com for details/booking/confirmation. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Aparant: Unbounded Hope Growing up democratically from the grassroots Miguel Braganza It is a new year. Today seems just like yesterday, except for the new found hope of the SEZ policy being consigned to the waste-basket of history. The Task Force on Regional Plan 2021 is continuing its consultative process with the stakeholders to preclude the pitfalls of RP 2011, which was revoked around this time last year. The NGOs and CSOs continue to give voice to aspirations of different sections of people. The meaning of apolitical people's movements is sinking in slowly. One is slowly learning the difference between developmental groups and advocacy. Goa is growing up to be worthy of democracy. Who said politicians must act out of selfless interest? That is not their business. The good news is that Goa is awakening in its villages. The message of the Goa Bachao Abhiyan finds its echo in the Keri Nagrik Samitee at Buthkhamb and Arla, in the People's Movement Against SEZ at Verna and Loutolim and the incipient movements at Naqueirim, Kolomb, Vathadev, Taleigao, Mandrem and other places. The people are beginning to speak at the Gram Sabha. It is no longer the feni and the beer that is doing the talking. Not the burp of the chicken xacuti, either. Sober men and women are finding that they have a voice that has remained largely unused. Gram Sabhas are no longer like a "Juke Box" delivering music that has been paid for. Vox Populi is reflecting the Vox Dei. God is speaking through the people of Goa. His omni-presence is being felt in the corridors of power. Goa has risen up like Phoenix from the ashes in the past according to historians. The Turkish traveler, Ibn Batuta, had done a thorough job of destroying Gopakkapatna or Goapuri in the 1300s under the instructions of the mad Emperor of Delhi, Mohammad Bin Tughlaq. He ravaged Gopakkapatna completely and utterly. Goa was blanked out of history for more than a decade. There was nothing and no one in this place worth mentioning. Fundacao Oriente has a number of books on this subject at Panaji. It resurrected over the last 600 years. We do not need a repeat show today. Goa as we know it now, is a creation of the Portuguese and the circumstances that made the Sondekar Raja to seek refuge of the Conde de Ega in 1764 at the Adil Shah's palace in Panaji. The seven talukas annexed by the Portuguese and the four talukas [Ponda, Sanguem, Quepem and Canacona] of the Kingdom of Sonde [or Sunda] given to its protection, is the Goa that was "liberated" on 18 and 19 December, 1961. Goa is actually a part of the Aparant, the land without boundaries, which is also known as the Konkan. The Konknne, or the inhabitants of the Konkan aparant, had a golden [sunheri] tradition of hospitality and their land was, therefore, referred to as "Sunaparant". Just like the golden sands on its beaches, it spread a golden carpet to all. One can still experience this in the villages of Goa. Sadashivgad would have been a part of Goa if the Sondekar Raja had decided faster when under attack by Hyder Ali's captains. More of it would have been part of Goa if he had made a pact earlier. In the same vein, one does not know what makes the people of Tiracol different from the people in Reddi, Shiroda, Banda, Sawantwadi or Vengurla, except that they did not come under Portuguese rule. These are all Konkan people, separated from us by accidents of history. I am not suggesting redrawing of political boundaries. I am just saying there is no cause for xenophobia. The people of these areas are not strangers. At the Goa Sudharop Community Development Inc annual awards function at the Kala Academy in December, 2007, I made a statement that it did not really matter to me who owned an urban forest as long as it remained a forest and did not become an amusement park. If a Pakistan-born person can be the Congress Prime Minister of India and another Pakistan-born person can be the elected by the BJP as "Leader of the Opposition" in the Lok Sabha, what is the problem with a Pakistan-born person managing a teashop in Colva? If not for the partition of India, the Pakistanis would be known as Indians like you and me. A Delhi-born man was the Chief of Army and the President of Pakistan, both at the same time. He still holds on to one of those two positions officially. There are plenty of Konkani speaking Goans in Karachi even today. Does that sink in or does it still stink of xenophobia? Uncontrolled greed destroys without any tangible gain to the destroyer in the long run. What did Tughlaq or Ibn Batuta really gain by destroying Goa? What did our Ministers and SEZ promoters really want to gain? They already have amassed more wealth than is good for their health, which fails them in spite of the best medical facilities. Can any 50 year old minister or industrialist with a posh bungalow, lots of land and a bank account flooded with money, truly claim that he is happier than a farmer of the same age who lives in Canacona, Sanguem or Sattari on rice cultivated by "Puran xeti" in the receding river beds or by "Slash and burn" Kumeri on the hills, who really does not have a piece of paper to claim that he even owns the land beneath his bedding? How many rich people are bereft of anyone to give their riches to because their children have migrated and left them with a choice between loneliness in their own homes .. or a home for the aged? Even in the days when there were no microwave warmers or "hot cases", and puri or bhakri were simply wrapped in banana leaf and kerchief to give to a loved one working on the hills, there was a Konkani idiom which read thus, "Mog aslear vodde un-un ghattar pavtai." [Which means "If there is love, puri can be delivered piping hot on the mountain ranges."] Love overcomes everything. It is this love that defines a Konkani , a Konknno or a Goan more than anything else. (ENDS) Miguel Braganza's column at: http://www.goanet.org/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=482 =========================================================== The above article appeared in the January 4, 2008 edition of Gomantak Times, Goa