Tuesday the 6th of April 2011 is a Black Day for the Konkani World when certain disguised communal konknni mergerists decided to marry the well known communal marathiwadis at the Azad Maidan to entertain themselves in an orgy of christian bashing. The then Convenor of Konkni Porjecho Avaz Shri Pundalik Naik and Uday Bhembre, the then little known before the KPA just like the GBA's Oscar, were carried overboard by their communal passions and seemed to have conveniently forgotten history of the Konknni movement. And so were the N. Shivdas and Ramesh Verluskar elements who taught and retired from teaching in then diocesan English medium schools managed by the very nuns and priests that their counterparts chose to abuse. We did not miss the spectacular sight of the exchanges between President of the Konknni Basha Mandal and the leaders of name plaque smashers of Fontainhas and the intruders into the Bishop's House during the Parrikar regime.
They suffered a stroke of dementia and did not recall that the very mergerists before them were not there 25 years ago to fill the grounds of Azad Maidan and swell the numbers to gherao the Government Secretariat in Panjim. They failed to recollect in their bout of blindness from communal passion that the very nuns and priests with their Cristao followers they swear against now were the very ones that saved face for the ungrateful Pundalik Naik and his band of konknniwadis. It was not a Prashant or a Bhatikar that laid down their life for konkani, but a young Cristao called Floriano Vaz who probably never knew that 'Konkani' meant 'Konknni in the devanagiri script'. These mergerists who today bark about 'Goan sanskruuti' at Azad Maidan perhaps chose to forget that the very Cristaos they seek to persecute were far-sighted enough 43 years ago to oppose a merger with Maharashtra, when compared to their short-sighted communal mergerists who assembled at Azad Maidan today. Interestingly they have no problem with government aid for Kannada, Gujarati and Urdu government primary education. But 25 years later the shameless Cristaos of Goa are being given lessons on patriotism and nationalism by a bunch of diguised communal mergerists who hide behind masks of konknni patriotism. If other Cristaos are so foolish as to not see the disguised communal colours in a secular gown, we are definitely not. And for those who claim that Goa is a paradise of communal harmony, sorry it is no more. It is only that the venomous cocktail has not exploded yet. We thank God for the medium of instruction issue for it has helped publicly expose the weed from the corn. We are not at all surpised by these mercenaries because we had encountered them during the GBA experience. It was the gullible Goan who gets emotionally charged with no reason that needed to know the true colours. While we respect the right of every citizen to dissent, we have contempt for those who distort and communalise issues for their personal gains. And hopefully the Goan Cristao will not forget this part of history so as to offer himself or herself in the future for the pleasures of the communal mergerists and be repeatedly used as a door mat to protect Goa when convenient only to be later dubbed as anti-national and denationalised. But we will surely be there in future to remind these konknni fundamentalists of Goa's history at the most unexpected moments. My kith and kin will be reminded of this story of this mega treachery by the disguised communal konknni mergerists so that they may be wise enough to make the same blunders that we committed. And for us, this is going to spell the death of the konkani language. May God save Goa from the communal Konknni mergerists! -Soter
