Mogall Miguel-bab I shall leave what you say about me for another day because I feel it is not important at the moment. So let me come straight to the point. You say, << . actually part of the syndicate that has denied Konknni books in Romi lipi even a single award of Sahitya Puroskar for a DECADE since 1988. Do not tell me that Devanagri Konknni books were consistently found superior ...or that Adv. Uday Bhembre or the other Rats cannot read and understand Romi enough to discover the superiority of these books.>>
My response: This cry wolf story has been heard / read too often. At one time it was claimed that the Goa Konkani Akademi is meting out step-motherly treatment and doing injustice towards Romi writers by not assisting the publication of their books as it does in the case of Devanagari writers. And it sounded true, since the GKA had not published any Romi book for a long time. So everyone believed this to be the Gospel truth, especially since it was told by Catholics (priests included) for whom it is a sin to tell a lie. Nobody bothered to check the truth behind this fact. I did. And what did I find? (1) Not a single manuscript in Romi had been submitted to the GKA during all this time; therefore, the question of rejecting Romi books just did not arise. (2) Some Romi stalwarts undertook to write books but slept on the job. For instance, one such worthy has been sleeping on an anthology of 101 tiatr songs for well over 16 years! And yet he had the temerity to level the above charge against the GKA. So, pray, how does one expect the GKA to publish / assist in the publication of books whose manuscripts do not reach it? Charges of bias against judges at competitions is a common feature in Goa, as can be seen after every tiatr competition. This year was no different in this respect; one publisher of a Romi Konkani Monthly went to the extent of literally drowning the judges in his bile, even questioning their very credentials to sit on such a panel. But this year, a different type of incident also took place. Being tired of sitting it out in the Open Air Theatre, a leader realized that Natok Competitions are always staged in the Air-conditioned (AC) theatre whilst Tiatr Competition is held in the Open Air (OA) Theatre. Ergo, step-motherly treatment! Tiatr must be treated on par with Natok and the competition must be held in AC theatre. And so it was done. But the capacity of AC theatre is nowhere comparable to that of OA theatre. Result: scores of tiatr aficionados, whom the leader claims to represent, were left out in the cold. They had to enjoy some scuffles outside instead of the tiatr inside. This pent-up collective anger ended with fracas with the security personnel and some damage to the property of the Kala Akademi. Why bother about the riffraff when the leader can loll in air-conditioned comfort? After several such empty cry wolf episodes, stark lies and half-truths, many of which have already been exposed as such, comes the latest one about Sahitya Puroskars of the Kala Akademi: since 1988, Romi books have been consistently and unfairly denied this Award. This charge also rings true, because it fits the fact: no Romi book has earned this award for a long time. It tacitly and obviously assumes that there were Romi titles which merited the honour. However, Do not tell me that Devanagri Konknni books were consistently found superior is a hypothetical statement. In order to prove the charge we have to show that such books did exist in Romi at the relevant point in time. To test that aspect, Miguel bab, I have to make a sincere request to you. Please make a list of just TEN of the books which ACCORDING TO YOUR CAMP would have merited the award, had the judges and their selection been fair and unbiased. The books need not be listed in the order of merit; but, in each case, please state the following: (1) title, (2) author, (3) year of publication and (4) where and when a literary review/s of the book appeared in print. If possible, you could also provide a list of the undeserving titles in Devanagari which instead were unfairly given the award. With this information we should be able to make an objective (and comparative) assessment of the case. So, please help. Should you find it difficult to muster TEN Romi titles, please feel free to reduce the number to suit your convenience. And please do not take this as an affront, because it certainly is not meant to be so; it arises from some facts in my knowledge. (1) Some time back, I was informed that some persons in the Konkani Movement requested Felicio Cardoso and Tomazinho Cardozo to select some meritorious books in Romi so that they could be transliterated into Devanagari and rendered eligible to compete for the Sahitya Akademi award. Both of them are said to have expressed their inability in this regard because we do not have any books of that level in Romi. (2) About a decade ago, Shyam Verenkar, a colleague of mine at Chowgule College, was editing an anthology of literary essays in Konkani for the Sahitya Akademi. It was to be a representative collection of Konkani essays from all regions and in all the scripts, to be finally rendered in Devanagari. Since he was unable to read the Kannada and Malayalam scripts and did not feel conversant with all the literary output in Romi, he had requested the Akademi to suggest some experts to assist him in the selection of essays in these scripts. The writer from Mangalore (I cannot recollect his name) informed him that this literary genre is not much popular with Kannada script writers; yet, with some diffidence, he sent two essays. I transliterated those into Devanagari; I still remember the title of one of them: Kristanv Kazaram. Even after pestering Tomazinho bab for over a year, Shyam did not get a single essay. Finally Tomazinhos response was almost the same as that of the Mangalore author with the addition, the two you have selected are good enough, why do you need more? So the suggestion I have made to you as above is just to avoid putting you in an embarrassing situation. I hope you will understand and do the needful at your leisure. Please note that I am asking for the opinion of your CAMP and not just your PERSONAL view; therefore you will need some respite for consultations. Do take your time. There is an adage in Konkani: Dhankloli mutth sovai lakhachi. One can claim that he is holding a very valuable diamond in his closed fist; but the bluff will be called once the fist is opened. We shall know the truth once you open your CAMPs fist, as suggested above. Xevttim Sotachench Zoit Zatolem! Mog asum. S. M. Borges --- Miguel Braganza <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Mogall Sebastianv-Bab, > > The RATS are not imaginaery at all. They are a real > part of the > virtual Konkani world created by the "ONLY Devanagri > for the future" > lobby. The rest of us are alive and kicking till > today. > > The likes of you may write in Romi [in Gulab, etc] > and promote > Devanagri. We do what we believe, in Romi for Romi > AND other scripts > traditionally used for Konknni bhas. > > > It does not matter to me whether the Sahitya > Puroskar is given to > anyone or not. What matters is that Adv. Uday > Bhembre, who insists > that Romi writers be given all facilities WITHOUT > TOUCHING THE ACT > [OLA, 1987] is actually part of the syndicate that > has denied Konknni > books in Romi lipi even a single award of Sahitya > Puroskar for a > DECADE since 1988. Do not tell me that Devanagri > Konknni books were > consistently found superior ...or that Adv. Uday > Bhembre or the other > Rats cannot read and understand Romi enough to > discover the > superiority of these books. Did they not become > popular by writing in > Romi, which has the largest readership in Goa? Did > not Konknni become > the Official Language of Goa on the sacrifice > ...even martyrdom of > Floriano Vaz ....of the Romi readers? Even rats have > brains, minute > though they may be. They can understand this even if > they seek to > ignore it ...and banish it from living memory. > > Perhaps, they have read enough of Devanagri to find > the plagiarism in > their hoarded "Bangarsal" rice ;-( > > I will answer your other points later. > > Mog asundi. > > Miguel > > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com