Your characterisation of him as someone who would do anything (or something) for a few rupees (or many rupees) is so off the point, as anyone who knows Mr Dias would acknowledge.
I think he got unnecessarily trapped into the VCD issue, in being this was due to the chess-player nature of a political strategist that Parrikar is. Who better to find to defend a bigoted, communalised VCD than a trade union leader with progressive inclinations?
If you know Mr Dias well, the bee-in-his-bonnet (we all have one, or more, don't we?) is the freedom struggle. That was factor number one. Secondly, the Parrikar regime played neatly the card of assuaging sentiments linked to groups who felt they were deprived their place in history, the rendering of which they felt -- probably not without reason -- was being dominated by others. The heightened role to the AVC (Assolna-Velim-Cuncolim) protests in the controversial VCD, to my mind, was no coincidence.
Finally, Dias painted himself into a corner, probably with active support of the behind-the-scene puppeteers. There was no reason for him to defend the VCD when he and his team were responsible for just the script. (There's nothing too very controversial with the script; it's the visualisation that is the huge controversy.) There's a big difference between the two. Would a hard-core pornographic film be quite acceptable simply because the script is, er, rather tame and not-so-controversial?
We must concede that there are other factors. Flaviano Dias belongs to a group of Goans of Catholic background (whether practising or otherwise) who swam against public opinion and didn't support Portuguese colonial rule in Goa. They see those who support a Portuguese-dominated Goa as having to be still challenged in the battle of ideas; and perhaps not wrongly so. If you follow the debate over the VCD, you would see at least a tinge of pro-Portuguese sentiments emerge now and then. Even if the freedom fighters compromised themselves badly (for most part) by getting incorporated into the system of blandishments of the Indian state, it doesn't follow that the idea of European colonialism was an acceptable idea. (Neither do the many problems of today's Goa justify that, as some expats try to make it out to be.)
It was apallling to see the arguments being put forth against the VCD, which only reflects the intellectual bankruptcy of those among the minority community who believe they can fight a battle against communalism on their own. Look at some of the recent issues of 'Renewal' and you might appreciate what I'm talking about.
I have problems with a respected senior colleague like Flaviano Dias accepting a felicitation from groups like the RSS. Academics like Romila Thapar have politely declined awards like the Padma Shree even from a (for now) not-so-controversial Congress government, and surely journalists too need to keep their distance. But then, in part this could be seen as a knee-jerk response to a state policy which (except strategically in the BJP years) seldom recognises the work put in by its citizens.
I'm not defending Mr Dias or explaining away his actions; all that I'm trying to do is to suggest that your understanding on this issue is far from doing justice to the man whom I know for the past two decades. FN
_____ _/ ____\____ Frederick Noronha * Freelance Journalist * Goa \ __\/ \ India T +91.832.2409490 M +919822 122436 | | | | \ http://fn.swiki.net http://goabooks.swiki.net |__| |___| / http://www.bytesforall.net http://www.bytesforall.org \/ ----------------------------------------------------- Writing with a difference, on issues that really make the difference.
