One of my favourite pastimes is to watch the live telecast of the Goa Legislative Assembly Sessions.
On Thursday or Friday, Vijay Sardessai was arguing about the arbitrary interpretation of a Supreme Court order by a Deputy Collector. It seemed that a certain party in Fatorda had erected a cross in his private property and the Dy. Collector had ordered the police to demolish the cross citing the Supreme Court ruling on roadside shrines. While Vijay Sardessai put up a spirited fight, and the Dy. C. M Francis D'Souza put up an equally spirited defense of his minion, others who intervened - Reginald Lourenco and the LoO Pratapsing Rane were rather tame. Now if the previous opposition party was there, they would have stormed the well and generally created a ruckus till the Government of the day conceded the point. But the present opposition just gave in meekly. The argument put up by the minister was that there was an appellate authority to sort the problem so let the party appeal if it thought it was aggrieved. The opposition thought that the officer was to be reprimanded in order to prevent a repeat. It is sad that we don't have an effective opposition to curb the Government. Viva Goa -- ** "Tony de Sa" < tonydesa at gmail dot com > **
