MARIAN PINHEIRO
There is a question increas ingly heard in conversa tions across Goa—some times with anger, sometimes with helplessness and increas ingly with urgency: Who will save Goa? It is a disturbing question be cause Goa is not facing merely an environmental problem. What many Goans fear is be ing lost is something far larger: the character of its villages, its landscape, its cultural distinc tiveness, the affordability of its land and homes, the sustaina bility of its economy, confidence in its institutions and, above all, the belief that ordinary citizens still have some control over the future of their State. For a State measuring only 3,702 square kilometres, every hill, wetland, agricultural field, forest patch and coastal stretch that disappears matters dispro portionately. Goa does not pos sess unlimited land into which mistakes can later be absorbed. What is converted today may never return. That is why the debate about Goa cannot be reduced to pol itics between the ruling party and the Opposition. Govern ments change. Political parties rise and decline. Goa remains. The crisis of the political mandate Perhaps nothing has dam aged public confidence in Goa’s electoral system as seriously as the extraordinary political de fections witnessed after succes sive Assembly elections. In July 2019, ten of the fif teen Congress legislators in the Goa Assembly moved to the BJP. In September 2022, eight of the eleven Congress legislators elected only months earlier again crossed over to the BJP through what was de scribed as a merger of the leg islature parties. When citizens elect a candi date belonging to one political party and that representative subsequently joins the very po litical formation against which he or she sought votes, an una voidable moral question arises: what happened to the voter’s mandate? Today one party may benefit from defections; tomorrow an other may. What is weakened permanently is public trust. The danger is greater than the fate of an individual politi cal party. If elections are under stood merely as contests to ob tain a seat after which political allegiance becomes negotiable, democracy gradually becomes disconnected from consent. The ballot must mean some thing after counting day. Goa’s own history demon strates that its citizens have intervened decisively whenev er they believed the identity or future of their homeland was threatened. The greatest example re mains the historic Opinion Poll of January 16, 1967, the first such exercise in independent India. Goans rejected the pro posal to merge Goa with Maha rashtra and chose to preserve Goa as a separate political en tity. Goa eventually achieved Statehood in 1987. The struggle for recognition of Konkani provides another example. The Goa, Daman and Diu Official Language Act was enacted in 1987, and Konkani subsequently entered the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution in 1992. These achievements did not descend as gifts from political establishments; they emerged from sustained cultur al and public mobilisation. More recently, citizen move ments have repeatedly forced development questions into public debate. The controversy surrounding Regional Plan 2011 produced a mass mobilisation and ulti mately resulted in the plan be ing scrapped. The Save Mollem movement brought together environmentalists, villagers, students and citizens opposing the ecological consequences of three major linear infra structure projects affecting the Bhagwan Mahavir Wildlife Sanctuary and Mollem National Park. And the movement con tinues. During 2026, hundreds of citizens protested against pro visions of the Town and Coun try Planning Act, particularly Sections 17(2) and 39A, the intensity of the protests itself demonstrates something signif icant: Goans have not become indifferent to what happens to their land. Politicians cannot be expected to save Goa Every election brings man ifestoes. Parties promise em ployment, infrastructure, en vironmental protection, better education, responsible tourism and clean administration. Yet after elections, citizens have remarkably little control over which promises receive priori ty and which quietly disappear. Perhaps Goa needs to reverse the manifesto itself. Instead of political parties telling Goans what they intend to do for them, why should the people of Goa not tell every po litical party what they are re quired to do? Before the 2027 Assembly election, Goa’s civil society, vil lage organisations, professional bodies, environmental groups, teachers, students, economists, architects, farmers, fisherfolk, business organisations and or dinary residents could collec tively prepare a People’s Mani festo for Goa. It should not be a romantic document containing a hun dred impossible demands. It should contain perhaps ten or fifteen measurable commit ments fundamental to Goa’s survival over the next decade. Protection of ecological ly sensitive land, transparent land-use planning, preserva tion of agricultural fields and water resources, scientific car rying-capacity studies before major development, sustaina ble tourism, affordable hous ing for residents, better public transport quality, government education, diversified employ ment for Goan youth, protec tion of Goa’s architectural and cultural heritage, responsible management of waste, water and sewage, public disclosure of major planning decisions. Most importantly, every com mitment should have a measur able deadline. Every candidate seeking election should be invited, by citizens of the constituency, to a public meeting. Ask the candidate: Do you ac cept these priorities? If not, why not? If elected, what will you ac complish within the first hun dred days? What within one year? What within five years? How will it be financed? How will environmental con sequences be measured? Will you publicly disclose your position before voting on legislation involving major land-use changes? And perhaps the most impor tant question: if elected on one party’s ticket, will you under take to return to the electorate before changing political alle giance?
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Such a commitment may be moral rather than legally en forceable. Democratic culture is built not only through laws but also through conventions, expectations and consequenc es. The candidate’s answers should be recorded and public ly available. Then, every six months, citi zens could hold a Constituency Accountability Meeting. The MLA should be invited to ex plain what has been achieved, what has failed and why. A publicly maintained scorecard could record progress against the commitments made before the election. This is not hostility towards elected representatives. It is precisely what the expression “public servant” should mean. From protest politics to permanent civic power Goa’s people’s movements have demonstrated an impres sive capacity to mobilise when a particular hill, forest, village, river or planning provision comes under threat. Their weakness is that many emerge only after the threat becomes visible. The next stage of Goa’s demo cratic evolution must therefore move from reactive protest to permanent citizen oversight. Citizens should not have to assemble thousands of people every time questionable plan ning is suspected. The system itself must provide transparen cy before irreversible decisions are taken. Public consultation should become meaningful rather than ceremonial. Planning docu ments should be easily acces sible. Proposed changes in zon ing should be digitally mapped. The reasons for governmental decisions should be publicly available. Environmental and infrastructure data should be translated into language ordi nary citizens can understand. A tiny State such as Goa is uniquely suited to such partici patory democracy. Its size, edu cated population, strong village identities and active civil soci ety should make direct public accountability easier than in vastly larger States. Saving Goa requires not merely better politicians but better citizenship. Goans must learn to vote beyond party loyalty, religion, caste, personality, patronage and immediate benefits. Candi dates must be judged on com petence, integrity, independ ence of mind and commitment to Goa’s long-term interests. And citizens must be pre pared to question even the political party they personally support. If Goa is to be protected, its people must transform them selves from an electorate that is consulted once every five years into a citizenry that remains engaged throughout those five years. History has already shown that when Goans recognise an existential threat, they can transcend political divisions. The challenge now is to trans form that episodic people’s power into a permanent demo cratic institution. The 2027 election should therefore not merely ask: “Who should rule Goa?” But “What must anyone who seeks to rule Goa undertake to do?” Goa cannot wait for a political saviour. If Goa is to be saved, the peo ple of Goa will have to save it themselves. (The writer is a professor of law & an education consultant )
