CANACONA: Not satisfied with the assurances he got from various authorities till now, Natividade D’Sa, a resident of Canacona has requested in a letter he wrote recently to the Portuguese prime minister for assistance and intervention in restoring the festivities at the two Portuguese era religious shrines on Anjadiva island which still remains part of Goa technically even though the entire island has been gifted to the defence ministry.
Natividade D’Sa, a septuagenarian from Canacona who has been dedicating his time and energy for social causes, has since last three years been pained to see that his efforts to resolve the long pending issue of holding masses on the feast days of Our Lady of Springs Church and St Francis de Assisi chapel not yielded any positive outcome.
These two shrines were built soon after Portuguese set foot on Anjadiva at the beginning of 15th century.
The church dedicated to Our Lady of Springs which was in ruins is refurbished by Archeological Survey of India in 2018 while the chapel built and dedicated to St Francis de Assisi is in total ruins with the entire roof caving in due to lack of maintenance since the Navy occupied the island over 30 years ago.
With no tangible solution coming in and seeing that most of his efforts going in vain, D’Sa wrote a letter to the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi and Prime Minister of Portugal simultaneously to intervene and restart the celebration of feasts of the two patrons on February 2 and October 4, every year from here on.
The PMO on receipt of D’Sa’s letter has since then sought information from various authorities who are related to this island for more information on the questions raised by D’Sa.
The chief secretary of Goa, Sea Bird naval sea base and the Uttar Kannada district administration have already sent their individual reports to the PMO on the questions raised by D’Sa.
However, to another query of D’Sa over the missing artifacts belonging to the church the authorities in Goa wanted to visit Anjadiva Island to conduct preliminary investigations.
Highly placed sources close to this enquiry informed Herald that while they got approval to take their official vehicle across the border to Karwar in Karnataka, the authorities at naval base at Binaga, Karwar however denied entry to this team.
“We were supposed to visit Anjadiva island with the investigation officer of Canacona police on October 23 to conduct preliminary investigation on the issue of missing artifacts as alleged by the complainant, D’Sa but when we spoke with the in-charge of the Sea Bird naval base, he said that the island belongs to navy and entry without authorisation is banned as this island falls in the category of restricted area,” he said.
“Now we have written to the Collector of South Goa to facilitate entry on the island as this island is in the jurisdiction of Canacona taluka,” a highly placed source said.
Meanwhile, D’Sa who is closely following this case was ecstatic when he received a reply from Portuguese Prime Minister’s Office acknowledging that they have received a letter from him to intervene into the matter of holding feast masses in the Catholic religious shrines built during the Portuguese rule of Goa which are of significance to the community.
The letter received by D’Sa is written in Portuguese a copy of which is in possession of Herald when translated reads that “The Prime Minister’s Office acknowledges the receipt of your letter and the Prime Minister of Portugal will study as to how to look into the issue.”
D’Sa unable to control his excitement said that he has been referred in the letter as Konkani Mogi.
