G'BYE GOA: GOANS OF TODAY.
By Valmiki Faleiro
Chandan Lakra, Kavitadevi Jangam and Ranjan Pandia are today's Goans who won
medals for Goa at the recent (July-2009) Lusofonia Games in Lisbon. Goa's own
Sonali Chakraborty won 3rd place at a national essay competition in April-2008.
"Miss Goa" last year was a lass named Harshita Saxena.
Sample three reports from the single edition of a local paper (June 8, 2009):
* Town Police Inspector today said that Tara Sumappa Rajput reported theft of a
temple donation box at Monte, Margao.
* In another case, the PI disclosed that they have arrested Mahendra Dave,
native of
Rajasthan, on a complaint of cheating by Kimraj Chowdhury, resident of Margao.
* Fearing surgery, a 40-year-old resident of Cumbarjua committed suicide, per
Ponda
PSI Tukaram Chavan, investigating the case under supervision of PI, C.L. Patil.
Sharada Rathod who knows not to read or write, and signs with her thumb, is/was
Sarpanch of Sancoale, once a hoary village of prominent Salcete Saraswats,
including Margao's Vithalwadi-Comba Naiks.
Former MLAs Sangeeta Parab, Mohan Amshekar, Shambu Bhau Bandekar, Babuso
Gaunkar and sitting MLA Victoria Fernandes, at a "Legislator's Day" not long
ago,
staged a play titled, "No SEZ, no Kannada CM!"
Migrants are not so visible today because bulk is from the labour class. A
family of
ten could be crammed into the outhouse of a Goan's larger house of perhaps two
or
three occupants. Give the younger migrant generation time to be educated and
grow.
That's when, slowly but surely, village panchas and Sarpanchas, civic
councillors and
mayors, MLAs and the Chief Minister would be ... toss a coin . a Kannadiga or
Kashmiri, a Malayali or Maharashtrian.
It's just a matter of a few years.
A million migrants would make no difference in a large state. In a place like
Goa, with
just over one-half million souls in 1961, already strapped with mass emigration
and a
negative birth rate, this phenomenal population surge translates into an
altogether
different story.
Realities are reflected even in villages. Try approaching someone by the
roadside
(for directions, for instance.) The odds are that you will be greeted with a
"boliye"
(speak up) or "malum nahin" (I don't know.) Older post-1961 migrants sure know
the
local lingo and the locality as well as a Goan.
As of now, forget industry where Goans won't account for 10% of workers, either
because they lack the skills, shun menial jobs, or despise low wages. Common
occupations like fishing, vending (check the fruit and vegetable markets across
Goa),
street hawkers, cooks and waiters, drivers/conductors of public transport buses,
construction and road workers, barbers, even beggars . bulk is migrant. (More on
this next Sunday.)
Where there is work, and no local workers, migrants are bound to be attracted,
like
bees to a flower. Migrants are here because a livelihood is here.
The demography of Goa has so changed that USA-based friend Arnold Noronha
remarks, "Departing Goa for a long sojourn, an expatriate, on returning, could
feel
like Rip Van Winkle in the Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The land he once knew,
traditionally and culturally, has yielded to inexorable vicissitudes carrying
the Tides of
History."
Wrote the famed Indian journalist Jug Suraiya on April 1, 2006: "Last week when
I
was there, Goa whizzed past me. Goa? Whizzing? How could laidback Goa ever be
made to whiz? What was whizzing about were people. Not local Goans, but people
from outside ... Goa is selling like hot vindaloo. And pretty soon there'll be
no more of
it left to sell, or to buy. And when that happens, Goa will stop being Goa and
become
something else. Like Ghatkopar, or Brixton, or Greater Kailash III. Already
Baga and
Calangute look like Lajpat Nagar market. The thought saddens me. For when Goa
stops being Goa, what will Goans do? Rent the place back from the new owners?"
P.S: One can only sigh when an environmentalist of the commitment of Rajendra
Kerkar is being ostracized in his home village, for pursuing the tiger-killing
case.
Obvious the trap was not laid for a tiger (no one eats tiger meat here.) When
one got
ensnared, the trap-layers must have decided the best way out was to kill the
wounded animal. But ostracize Kerkar? (ENDS)
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The above article appeared in the Herald, Goa, edition of October 4, 2009
