FRIDAY, APRIL 19, 2024
Mousinho de Ataíde
This date hundred and thirty years ago was written in blood of our brothers, whose only crime was to assert their civic rights.
There was an election to the civic body of Salcete on that day. One of the booths was at the Municipality building of Margão, now tottering in full view of the self-respectful ‘marganenses’ of today passing by, forgetful of their history. The building is at the end of the Holy Spirit Square directly vis-à-vis the façade of the Church and therefore visible in full.
Elections in Goa were a phenomenon of the recent past after the advent of the liberal regime in Portugal. Universal suffrage was too much to be thought of and right to vote was a restricted lot, one of the main criteria being that one has to be a major tax payer.
At the bottom were the elections to the ‘Junta da Freguesia’, then to the Municipality (the Municipality of Ilhas was earlier pompously called ‘Senado de Goa) and finally to the Parliament. Formation of the lists of voters and candidates depended ultimately and very much on the Governor, and this gave rise sometimes to arbitrariness.
Elections having been introduced into the system, political parties sprang up to contest them. Some had strange names, eg, ‘Partido Patuléa’, ‘Partido Chafarica’, but the main ones were the ’Partido Indiano’, led by José Inácio de Loyola, from Chinchinim, and the ‘Partido Ultramarino’, led by Bernardo Francisco da Costa, from Margão. The former had as its mouthpiece ‘A Índia Portuguesa’ and the latter ‘O Ultramar’.
Though elections were objectively a restricted affair, yet they generated thunders and lightning. They were hotly contested and oftener than not stooped to violent fights, both oral-written and factual, including murders. All this gave rise to popular ‘cantaram’ and ‘ mandde’, giving a folkloric touch and shape to them. Voters and candidates might have been necessarily not many, as they are today, but these major taxpayers had their retinue of supporters, and the fights would be invariably among these latter.
When 21st September 1890, the D-Day, dawned, the candidates and voters with hordes of their supporters, many of them intoxicated for the purpose and armed with sticks and stones, turned up at the Holy Spirit Square. The supporters of the two main parties fought pitched battles with each other. Some stormed the Municipal Building. The Governor, Vasco Guedes de Carvalho e Menezes, the whole administration and even the Judiciary, were not neutral referees, but had very much their own candidates whom they wanted by hook or crook to win.
Expecting trouble, which was the normal lot in such elections, and specially wanting his candidates to win, the Governor sent a posse of three hundred armed troops. When the crowd turned uncontrollable, the Commander ordered his troops to fire, as a result of which some twenty (or twenty three, according to some) were massacred, among whom was the retarded Ponciano Albuquerque, whose only crime was to stand on the side and watch the scene. Among the stories which usually crop up in situations of confusion, is the gruesome episode of a man who, in utter revulsion, came from the sidelines and, in an act of bravado, challenged a soldier to shoot him not on his chest, but on his rectum, which the soldier did promptly! And these are the people who came to our land, wanting to civilize us! What a travesty!
The Parish Priest, who should have rushed to the Square like a deer and roared like a lion, went instead sheepishly to administer the last sacraments to the fallen ones.
And what about the great Patriarch Antόnio Sebastião Valente? Should he not have fulminated with excommunication the Governor, the Commander and others who perpetrated the horrendous massacre? And remember that the maximum majority of the victims were from his own flock. Greatness lies precisely in rising to the crises! Let it be noted that among the victims there was also one Hindu, ancestor of the illustrious family of Datta Damodar Naik ,of Comba-Margão.
After the peace literally of the tomb had been established, elections were held. But voices were raised in Goa and outside Goa against the massacre, reaching even the ears of the Metropolis. Action was swift: the Governor and the Commander were removed, elections were annulled and new ones held. But it was too little, and definitely not commensurate with the enormity of the crime.
After the tragic incident of the massacre, singers and mandde composers rose to form. One which was a hit, was ‘Setembrachea Ekvisaveri’, composed by Carlos Trindade e Dias. It has four strophes, and I give them here in English translation:
“1. On the 21st September they broke down the door of the Municipality Building. They brought three hundred soldiers to Margão, in a ship from Panjim.
“2- They started taking photographs on the Fidalgo’s balcony, oh Loyola. They summoned soldiers by blowing trumpets, and they started stabbing people with their bayonets.
“3. When the last Mass was over, Ponciano’s blood began to flow. How dark the Mulato is, oh Loyola! Shots were fired at the people.
“4- There were streams of blood in the Church Square, oh Loyola. Come, Fr. Lucas, sprinkle your holy water and save souls”
The English version does not have the punch of the Konkani original.
We Goans, specially the ‘Marganenses’, owe to the sacred memory of the martyrs not to allow the building of the Municipality to be obliterated. After all it is the eloquent witness to the ferocity of the colonialists and the sacrifice of our forefathers. We also require to commemorate the tragic event every year in front of the crumbling Municipal Building, with the chanting of the above manddo.
