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Could Goa steal 1857's thunder?
Mayabhushan
http://www.dailypioneer.com/245983/Could-Goa-steal-1857%c3%a2%e2%82%ac%e2%84
%a2s-thunder.html
So we all know - an enraged catalyst in Mangal Pandey, cattle and pig lard
smeared on cartridges and a hurt national conscience triggered India's first
officially recognised war of Independence in 1857.
However, a quiet, yet sustained campaign is gathering steam here, to haul
back the date of India's first war of Independence by more than 300 years;
from the dusty plains of northern India to the emerald green, river-riddled
backdrop of Goa.
The campaign - which is endorsed by historians, freedom fighters, elected
representatives and local residents - wants the Central Government to
officially recognise the prolonged defiant struggle of five south Goan
villages, namely Cuncolim, Ambelim, Assolna, Veroda and Velim, against the
Portuguese colonists in the 16th century, as the India's first war of
Independence.
The struggle, in which several lives were lost, dates back to 1542 when
Kshatriya inhabitants of the five villages started a series of
confrontations with the Portuguese colonists. According to freedom fighter
and author Flaviano Lobo, the confrontation from 1542 to 1583 by these five
villages began with boycotting tax payment to colonizers and refusing to bow
down to forceful conversion tactics by Jesuit missionaries.
"Residents of the five villages, whose population was essentially Hindu
Kshatriyas, had defied Portuguese taxes before the Jesuit missionaries
destroyed five temples in the area to pulverise the flock into submission,"
Dias said.
The Jesuit priests then went on to build a church amid the ruins of temples
now destroyed, when enraged villagers from Cuncolim attacked them with
spears, swords and bows and arrows, killing leading Jesuit missionary
Rudolfo Acquaviva and his colleagues.
While the Roman Catholic church later anointed the dead priests as saints,
the Portuguese colonisers had a different plan for the revolting villagers.
"Sixteen chieftains from Cuncolim were called for a truce to a nearby fort.
They were ambushed and shot to rags by the Portuguese soldiers as
retaliation. A couple of the chieftains managed to escape and tell the
story," said Dias, who comes from the lineage of one of the slain chiefs.
Shantaram Naik, a Congress MP from the Rajya Sabha, who is actively pursuing
the campaign to put the Cuncolim revolt as the first landmark on the map of
India's nationalist history, said the State Government was in the process of
setting up a panel of historian and experts to authenticate the series of
events. "We need to give the Central Government rigorously-researched
material backing our claim. We are confident that the Cuncolim revolt will
get its place in history, that it richly deserves," Naik said.
Naik, however, admits it would be a difficult journey, given the headstart
Mangal Pandey's exploits and the year 1857 have had in history books. "We
cannot blame anyone. We are at fault. We needed to project our history
properly. We failed to do that over the years," Naik said.
Armstrong Vaz, a Cuncolim resident who has been researching the issue,
maintains that the social, religious and economic issues which arose out of
the revolt need to be researched. "Also, the religious persecution which
Hindus suffered after the revolt and the massacre of the Cuncolim village
chieftains by the Portuguese at Assolna, also need to be portrayed in the
right manner," he said.
