GOA'S RESTING PLACES by Valmiki Faleiro.

GOA’S RESTING PLACES

By Valmiki Faleiro.

Hours after I filed last Sunday’s column early Feb 3 morning, came the news thatGoa had lost Chandrakant Keni. When persons one considers role models move on,one gets stumped by a strange sense of emptiness. Invisible tears. I felt this when I was 16, when I lost my father. I had felt it a year before when anotherwise good swimmer, Taumaturgo Sales Andrade, married to my dad’s secondcousin Helena Borges Vas, was carried to after life by undercurrents off Colva, saving his drowning son. Felt the same when one of Goa’s great sons, Manoharrai Sardesai, departed.

Much has been written about the many facets of Chandrakant Keni. May I only share why I considered him a great human being as well. The year must have been 1965. I was a single-digit age, short pants-clad, rascal. My eldest sister Neva and her younger sibling, ahead by a year at school, awaited their SSC results, then of the Pune Sub-Divisional Board. Neva was not expected todo well. So I was deputed by my dad to fetch the possibly bad tidings. Results those days arrived on teleprinter links at newspaper offices. The Marathi daily ‘Rashtramat’was a few houses away on the street by which I was born (and live.) ChandrakantKeni was its Editor. There already were jostling crowds of adults outside the newspaper’s office. I joined in, with severe physical disadvantage, the slip of paper with Seat Numbers securely in my fisted palm. I could achieve, despite sweat, no much progress towards thenewspaper’s front door. Just then arrived the editor, driving his light-green PremierPadmini. As he parked behind the crowd, he must have noticed tiny me in the crowd.I’d known him as some ‘biggie’ in the newspaper… He came straight for me. “Give me the seat number,” he said. I handed him my slip.I ran up to the higher ground across the narrow street. I was anxious I had not committed another of my home-errand blunders. The editor went up to the desk justinside the main door and, without interrupting the man checking the teleprinter sheets to give out people’s results, quietly traced a sheaf, noted something on my slip, andturned towards the door. I raced back, down the stone steps, to the street, in trepidation. “Whose numbers are these?” he asked rather nonchalantly. “My sisters,” my voice must have quivered.“Give them my congratulations,” he broke into a smile, handing me back the slip.That day, in my mind, Chandrakant Keni registered as a good man. 1978.

Morarji Dessai, on a maiden visit to Goa as India’s Prime Minister, was slatedto inaugurate the upgraded Health Centre at Balli, adjoining Chandrakant Keni’snative village of Cuncolim in Salcete. I was with the then ‘West Coast Times.’ In the press enclosure, I found myself seated besides Chandrakant Keni. I took copious notes as the PM spoke. On conclusion, he quietly asked me, “so what leadyou are going to take?” I was almost raw to political speeches. The bluffs mouthed so many fantastic thingsthat one was bamboozled deciding on the most important point to start the report.“No to alcohol, yes to piss first thing in the morning,” I said. Chandrakant Keni smiled, benevolently. And, in a few minutes, analyzed the issues Morarji raised, reasoning why he thought what must make the lead. He was a one-man School of Journalism, the B. Sadanand of Goa. (Sadanand was aBritish-time editor of Mumbai’s ‘Free Press Journal,’ who trained an entire generationof Indian journos.)

When men like Chandrakant Keni depart, something within snaps. If you think today’s column is uncharacteristic, I could not be in disagreement.(Scheduled for today was something, under this title, that we’ll come to next Sunday.) Because Chandrakant Keni was not characteristic or typical. He was especial. Peace be unto him, and courage to his family, including my friend – and his son-in-law –Harshvardhan Bhatkuly. (ENDS.)

The Valmiki Faleiro weekly column.

In Response to "UNAUTHORISED CUSTODIANS OF MORALITY"

Bijoy Joseph T has left a new comment on your post

"UNAUTHORISED CUSTODIANS OF MORALITY.":

Hi friend,

It’s remarkable!

To the extent you have portrayed the crime path inbuilt to the source of all these ‘unethical and brutal fellowships’ working under the stamp of religious / basically political background.

You really touched the sense of responsibility of parents / authentic religious units / more over rights of culture too.

Thanks, and I have no words to account for your contribution towards ‘the illicit act.

Regards,
BIJOY
bijoyjt@hotmail.com