ECOLOGICAL DESTRUCTION IN CANDOLIM.

 

Candolim village is very famous in many respects.  In this village there is one world famous Vaddo known as “Pintos” Vaddo made known worldwide by the world famous son of this Village and Vaddo,  Abe Faria the world renowned Hypnotist.  Also, Pintos Vaddo in Candolim gained worldwide publicity because of the Pintos revolution initiated by the Pinto people from this Vaddo “Pintos” in Candolim.  Attached to this Vaddo is a small hamlet like place called Araddy touching the Hill and where there were very few houses.  Earlier this place was inhabited  by the locals only but recently due to land price rise there is a big demand for this place even tempting the big builders to hunt for land there.  The infrastructure is very thin there for building mega projects where only the non Goans occupy these projects thereby upsetting the demographic structure not only of this are but also of Goa as a whole.

Picture 1 of the Site

 

According to elders, the Candolim Church in the beginning was to be built in Araddy Vaddo and even preliminary work for this job was conducted and the first phase of excavation was done.  However, to due unknown reasons, this project was shelved at Araddy and shifted to a place where the present Church is majestically standing now.

 

Picture 2 of the Site

 

Earlier because of small local population it was only one Araddy but now it is devided into two Araddys, original Araddy is called Old Araddy and the other is New Araddy where new settlers mainly the Migrants built their settlements with the blessing and nod of the local authorities.  This is one method by the local politicians to create a Vote Bank for them.

Picture 3 of the Site

 

In Old Araddy one mega project was already built there and occupied by the non-Goans, the second one is under construction and the third one is about to begin where the area is readied for putting a fence.  In this area there are lot of productive trees and plants  which naturally will be cut to make way for the new construction.  By cutting these Trees and Plants there will be negative effect on ecology which is to be protected by all means.  The local authorities has already cleared this project without realizing the bad effect on ecology which by all means has to be protected. 

 

Picture 4 of the Site

 

It is right time now for the social activists and the protectors of Ecology in Goa to intervene in this matter.  Also, it is imperative now for reviving Congress Party under its new Boss Luizinho Faleiro to find out from the local authorities the genuineness of this case because local authority owes its allegiance to Congress Party.

   

Picture 5 of the Site

A. Veronica Fernandes,
Candolim, Araddy,
Goa.

CONTRIBUTION OF PRIESTS & CHRISTIANS IN GOA'S FREEDOM MOVEMENT.

From 18^th December 1961 till the end of that month, in Candolim the atmosphere was tense, on 18^th itself at dawn the Indian Military invaders of Goa consisting of Tanks, Jeeps and other Military vehicles started moving on the main road going to Aguada to capture the strongly manned Portuguese citadel. Early in the morning my father was going to adjust the flow of water to our Paddy field.  He was wearing a sleeveless Banyan and a “Cheddi” up to his knees.  Suddenly, one top ranking Military personnel from the front Military vehicle spotted my father standing in our field 50 metres away from our house and stopped the movement of the Military vehicles, called my father thinking he was a “Paklo” because my father was fair.

When my father told the purpose of his being in the field, the Indian Military personnel asked my father “why you are wearing a Banyan?  For this. my father replied saying “I am a poor man”. Then the Military man replied saying “We know Portuguese has intentionally kept you Goans as poor.  But now, henceforth, you people will not remain poor any longer. We will drive the Portuguese out, make you rich and hand over your Goa into your own hands”.

Hearing these good tidings, my father came home smiling and all excited, saying Nehru Zindabad and Salazar Murdabad while this same father of mine a few minutes earlier while going to our field was saying just the opposite, that is Zalazar Zindabad and Nehru Murdabad.  It looked he was drugged by the invaders to bring about such a dramatic change in him.  However, to his regret, within a few days he repented for the change in his thinking because first disgraceful act Indian invaders did was to commit rapes though not in bigger scale but unbearable scale as per Goan standard.

During that week, in the evenings, Novenas “Salve” were going on in our Church to celebrate the feast of Nossa Senhora de Esperanca”,  on the last Sunday of the December month, as per the tradition.  Pe. Nicholau Noronha was the Pe. Vigar of our Church and being a man of wisdom he suspended for a few days evening Novenas to prevent raping of our female Church goers because during that period there was continuous flow of Indian Military personnel on the main road.  Though Pe. Nicholau Noronha distrusted Indian Military yet he welcomed the ouster of Portuguese rule from Goa and as an evidence of this he at Candolim Tinto somewhere on 23^rd of that month gave a small speech praising the invaders for getting rid of colonial rule and concluded saying “Now we in Goa will have democracy and freedom to express our views freely under the new government”.  Earlier, when he was writing for Portuguese Daily “A Vida”, his views on freedom were suppressed and banned by the order of the “Censors”.

Hearing his speech, some of the Hindus at the Tinto were surprised to know how a Christian Priest can be a  supporter of Jai Hind Raj? These Hindus were third class illiterates because they thought Jai Hind means Jai Hindu Raj and hence Goa under Bharati rule will be a Hindu Raj.  However, these stupid idiotic minded Hindus never knew the first Goans to raise their voice against Portuguese rule in Goa were Christian Priests under the banner of Pinto’s Revolt from Candolim Pintos Vaddo. Incidentally they were caught, arrested and publicly hanged in Panjim by the Portuguese government of Goa then.  At one place, history says that even French Revolution was planned after the Pinto’s Revolution.  Even Abe Faria the Priest son of Candolim Pintos Vaddo was a part of Pinto’s Revolt since the distance between his house and that of Pintos is just a few metres.

Christians and Priests from Goa played a very important role to free Goa from foreign domination.  Dr. Francisco Luis Gomes, a renowned Portuguese Parliamentarian  from Navelim, Salcette, Goa,  raised the issue of Goa’s freedom right inside European soil.  But all the intellectually bankrupt Hindus mainly from my village were not aware of this fact and  precisely for this reason they were dubbing Goan  Chrsitians as pro-Portuguese.  So much so, on 19^th  and 20^th of that month of December 1961, under the leadership of one fanatic Hindu, Balkrishna, some stupid Hindus were firing fire crackers in front of the local Christians and their houses near the Tinto. One Shamba Xett was even abusing Saint Francis Xavier by saying “Now where is your Goencho Saib gone” as if He is from Portugal.  Somebody was giving bad words to St. Anton.  

During this period in my village in Candolim in particular and in Goa in general,  there was fear into the minds and hearts of many Christias whom many Hindus treated as enemies of Indian Raj.  But in reality what role Goan Christians played for the ouster of colonial raj from Goa none others have played.  But our misfortune was that  during that particular period especially,  our Church leaders have failed to open their mouths loudly to silence the wrong opinion created of Christians.  Many times we as Christian community failed miserably because of our weak leadership based in Panjim at Altinho.

 

A. Veronica Fernandes,

Candolim, Goa.

Tel: 7507394349.

LUIZINHO FALEIRO BEWARE OF OLDGUARDS & DEFEATED CANDIDATES.

On Monday 22^nd of this month, I was invited by Luizinho Faleiro to give him a company for the Lunch at Hotel Mandovi in Panjim.  Luizinho and me known to each other from the time of language agitation when I took very active part from Kuwait in this movement.  Because I was fasting, I only had a fresh Orange Juice while he and other colleagues of him went ahead with their meals.  Many of those who were with Luizinho on the dining table were new Congressmen compared to me since I enrolled myself as a member of Congress while I was still a student, by paying Rs. 5/-  When I joined Congress, the Congress culture in Goa was service to the society and precisely because of this Congress Party jumped from outside the Legislature to inside and ruled in Goa for such a long period.

 

However, due to greed for illicit money, illicit  sex and brute political power, almost all the elected Congressmen bypassed the motto “Service to the Society” and got trapped on the wrong side in the last election where people like me disgusted with their ugly unCongress performance, kicked them out in the election foray.

 

The defeat for Congress in the last election was so  deep that to come back to the surface again, not one Luizinho Faleiro as Congress president but even with one hundred Luizinho Faleiros will not be able to revive the grand  old party which otherwise had fantastic record.  As he spoke to me on the dining table for about 45 minutes, he had lofty plans to revive the party prospects and he looked very serious but all these plans to be operational and successful, the induction of new and young faces will not be sufficient enough. He relies on new faces and young blood on the revival of Congress.

It is a good idea to bring the freshers into the forefront but they must be told to behave well in a disciplined manner purely in Congress culture and tradition and not to aspire for election tickets within a night. We have seen how yesterday’s youth Congress leader by becoming a hero within a night is turned into a most corrupt politician in Goa.  He not only sucked Congress in Goa but he even sucked the entire politics in Goa purely in the corrupt ways he learnt from corrupt Indian politics while he was a novitiate in corrupt youth Congress.   In view of this Luizinho Faleiro must be very careful with the new faces that generally speaking are having high political ambitions to grab political power by any means for the purpose of making fast money thru loot and thus  shamelessly live the life of Maharajas. Looting is not genuine Congress culture, it is the culture of the “Chors”.

Then I told Luiznho Faleiro that it will be next to impossible for him to revive the party with the presence of corrupt oldguards who were mainly responsible for the Congress debacle in the last election.  Is it possible for him to throw them out even though they rightly deserve it for anti-party activities?  Will Luizinho Faleiro take such a stringent action? Or the presence of his predecessor is imperative again to take hard decisions?  One thing is certain, unless severe disciplinary action is taken against all the erring Congressmen though most of them are artificial Congressmen, people like me will never support corrupt Congress candidates. On the contrary we will oppose such corrupt candidates.  Supporting Congress with all the corrupt Congressmen is like promoting corruption in an unCongress manner. Though Luizinho Faleiro is in a state of dilemma which may lead him into the Hamletic influence yet he must be bold enough to jump into Julius Caesarian citadel and say “I went, I saw and I conquered”.

 

The next topic I raised with him was the fate of Defeated Congress candidates who I strongly feel should not be given the tickets again to contest the forthcoming election.  They are now become like worms meant to feast on the dead bodies.  It is these corrupt candidates who did major damage to the Congress in the last election because of their arrogance, pride, dadagiri, goondagiri and Hitlerism.  While they were MLA’s they acted with the common folks especially in their own constituencies, like Portuguese time Bhattkars treating  others as their humiliated Mundkars.  Many of them were sadistic and revengeful and their victims were only the poor Goans. All these defeated candidates were rejected by their voters because people hated them for their revengeful nature as it happened below my nose.  Congress leaders in my constituency thought they are feudal lords to act with the people the way they deem it fit. Luiznho Faleiro must give them good lesson on how to deal with the people because our Congress leaders are not having genuine Congress culture of uprightness, lowliness, humility and simple life.  The current Congress culture is the culture of Maharajas which should be stopped right now if Luizinho Faleiro wants success in his new assignment.

 

A. Veronica Fernandes,

Candolim, Goa.

Tel: 7507394349.