In life, the story of the powerful crushing the less powerful or weak is seen worldwide. But in a democracy, where the equation between the powerful and the weak is defined by the common man who has the power to decide his destiny, the sight of the voter, either protesting or pleading in front of those they elect and whose wages they pay, is not just ironic.
It is unpardonable.
IT HURTS, when a 90-year-old has to stand on a railway track in Velsao with a banner, weak in limb but refusing to give up his protest against the destruction of storm water drains in his village. And why? Because the railways in their mad rush to lay the double tracks to transport coal have cared little for things like right of way, storm drains and traditional village accesses.
IT HURTS, when Ninety-six-year-old Minguelinho Mascarenhas, also from coastal South Goa, is forced to appeal to his fellow village residents, “to participate in this struggle to breathe clean air pro-actively”. In his sunset years, he is using the last drop of his energy to fight for the future of younger Goans and their children. The unfairness of the situation can’t be hidden by the brave and inspiring man’s values and spirit.
IT HURTS, when the High Court orders that Goa must notify a Tiger reserve within three months of its judgement, but the state, not only doesn’t not follow it but challenges it, or when vulnerable forest wealth gets shrunk at such a rapid pace that ultimately half of the available forests resources are opened for up for non-forest activities for (that 11 letter word that sounds more like a curse than a blessing to all these people) – DEVELOPMENT.
IT HURTS, when every river and backwater of Goa will soon be nationalised, thereby potentially breaking the age-old coexistence of Goan civilizations along river banks, with uncontrolled access to its resources that fed generations of families.
Now, it is the sand mafia with patronage, which controls the rivers. They plunder and loot the sand, while the police and the authorities are both tongue-tied and hand-tied.
And while the rivers go, our sea is polluted with garbage, weeds and other assorted rubbish that will only rise as the scourge of construction intensifies as the Dharavi model of development becomes the de facto model.
IT HURTS, when people in the mining areas in Bicholim and Shirgao are stunned that their lands, their temples and parts of the villages that for generations, villagers called their own, with no quarrel or dispute, will now be a part of a “mining lease area” through which iron ore-laden trucks will plough. Simply because they can.
While several milestones were ticked off in so many speeches on Republic Day, emphasising that Goa scored well across all parameters, these figures do not tell you these stories. Each of them is a deep,
throbbing, painful diary whose pages are filled with lament at how pieces and slices of the Goan way of life, beyond its soil, its rivers and its forests, are being taken away.
While land acquisition is linked with the start of economic activity and the usual promises of employment generation get associated with all such “development”, the ground reality is much harsher. The villages, small towns and other habitations through which the sword of development cuts, are losing their traditional village resources, uncontrolled access to water bodies and their traditional places of worship and community bonding- village temples. These places have a significance beyond religion. They are community and cultural melting pots.
The underlying, almost throbbing pain in all these stories across Goa is how little importance has been given to the destruction of the way of life, mainly by depleting the resources and people’s access to them. The nationalisation of so many Goan rivers is a major case
in point.
In January itself, the declaration of four of Goa’s rivers was announced. Cumbharjua river: (From Cortalim to Sao Mathias) – 17 kms; Mandovi River (Usgao bridge to the Arabian Sea – 41kms; Zuari river ( Savordem bridge to Mormugao Port) – 50 kms; Chapora River (Maneri to Morjim to be developed by 2030) – 25 kms.
While the case for nationalisation has been argued for better management of water resources and to prevent privatisation, people with traditional access to water bodies for their livelihoods and connectivity will be denied. They have also strongly alleged, that under the garb of better management of water resources, these nationalised water bodies are being prepared as transportation paths for private players, to move coal and other materials, using our backwaters. This will give a sense of how deep the nationalisation of rivers plan cuts.
What we are witnessing is gross environmental injustice, against all sustainable development Goals and norms, where people are an intrinsic part of the environment.
In a meeting of the UN Security Council on October 16, 2017, the UN Secretary-General told the council: “Competition over land, water, minerals and other natural resources will increasingly fuel conflict unless efforts are stepped up to manage them for the benefit of local people and engender peace through sharing, the Secretary-General told the Security Council today. The exploitation of natural resources, or competition over them, can and does lead to violent conflict. Shared natural resources have traditionally also been a catalyst for cooperation among States, communities and people.”
Why Goa cries is because leave alone sharing, absolutely nothing is left for local and traditional communities, as resources are snatched away from them, in an everyday saga of endless cruelty.
