These days the dominant discussion is around Citizenship Amendment Act, National Population Register and National Register of Citizens. However, in the pro-and anti-din on any issue, much remains in terms of the issues at stake that may not find adequate attention.
For instance, when the commercial Carnival parades were at their peak in the mid-and late-1980s, there was affirmation of the Carnival festival and of the parades and there was opposition to them. But both the support and opposition had many shades. Some supported the festival, while others opposed the parade.
The opposition came at that time from a section of the Church which maintained that the Carnival was a ‘pagan’ festival. There was also the stand by the Shiv Sena which opposed the Carnival parade because they thought it was a Christian festival and therefore deserved no State support.
There was the opposition from patriarchal Goans that ‘our’ women shouldn’t be up there on those floats, with skimpy clothes. Bailancho Saad, the local women’s collective, opposed the festival because it commodified women in these stage-managed State organised Carnival parades. There were thus different political positions and opinions of different sections of Goan society.
But in all these discussions were nestled and continue to be nestled the politics of representation and the politics of what is called development. Whose voices and whose narratives get heard in all this din? Is it the narratives of those sections of society that are always dominant? Who takes decisions on development and development projects? How are these decisions taken? Does this not require that we ensure that the narratives of various sections of society in Goa should be brought to the fore?
Similarly, with regard to the Opinion Poll, there are differing opinions, even as many Goans agree that it was a good thing that Goa’s unique and separate identity was maintained. India had annexed Goa in December 1961. Until then, Goans were considered Portuguese citizens – technically full citizens, so a person from Goa could contest and get elected as part of Portugal. Unlike the British who did not give the residents of their colonies full citizenship. In the statement of objects and reasons of the 12th amendment to the Constitution of India, by which Goa was considered a part of India, the statement read, “On the acquisition (emphasis mine) of the territories of Goa, Daman and Diu with effect from December 20, 1961, these territories have, by virtue of sub-clause (c) of clause (3) of article 1 of the Constitution, been comprised within the territory of India from that date and they are being administered as a Union territory by the President through an Administrator in accordance with article 239 of the Constitution. It is, however, considered desirable that Goa, Daman and Diu should be specifically included as a Union territory in the First Schedule to the Constitution”.
On January 16, 1967, a referendum was held to decide the future of the Union territory of Goa within the Indian Union. Essentially, the terms of the referendum were around whether Goa should remain a separate entity or be merged into Maharashtra and the result of the referendum was that Goa should be retained as a separate entity within the Indian union. This was therefore not an entity on linguistic lines as had happened with several other States in India, through the States Reorganisation Act, 1955, when Goa was not politically part of the Indian union.
Therefore Goa is not a linguistic State, created around Konkani. Because Konkani is spoken beyond Goa along the Konkan coast. But the other pockets of India where Konkani is spoken are not part of Goa because Goa is essentially one of the locations (a contiguous space) of the Estado da India Portuguesa, which Portugal had colonised. However, before this, the control of different parts of pre-Portuguese Goa shuffled between the Delhi Sultanate, the Deccan Sultanates, and the Vijayanagar kingdom for close to two centuries before the arrival of the Portuguese.
But the important thing is that there was a referendum. There were some issues around who was allowed to vote in that referendum. But the fact remains that there was at least a plebiscite of sorts. Something that Government is not ready to think about today, not with reference to Kashmir, not with reference to Assam? Therefore it is necessary to unearth what these processes were, how they played out, what decisions are being taken then and now in the name of development, who is taking those decisions.
It is also important that while we retain the uniqueness of Goa, we cannot retain the discrimination and denial of access to proper full citizenship within Goa. The unearthing is necessary so that we can understand the politics behind the random statements made by those in governance including the most announcement of the CM of Goa that military training “will inculcate patriotism in all Indians— and today, that is required in the country”, which is actually his recipe for further militarisation of the country at the cost of the lives and livelihoods of the people. Be it in global politics, regional or local politics, there is a certain dominance of narratives, and this dominance is driven by certain nation states (for example, USA), class, caste, creed, gender, ethnic origin, ableism and other axis of marginalisation.
As another Opinion Poll Day has come around, it is time various narratives in terms of reflections on happenings around us, which have long been suppressed come to the fore.
(Albertina Almeida
is a lawyer)
