The Good Samaritan: Pouring healing balm over wounds

Sometime last month, this column began an engagement with what it termed the Catholic bigot (CB). The intention was not to label all Catholics bigots, but point out to a peculiar strain of bigoted thinking among Goan Catholics. The idea was that this could possibly lead to an internal debate and prevent us from falling into the form of thinking that marks the bigot among the Goan Catholic. Delineating the contours of the imagination of the CB is important because of the times we live in, where this bigotry only serves to fuel the provocations of the Hindu right-wing. Once more it should be pointed out, not every Hindu is fascist, but given the contours of Indian nationalism and dominant thought, it is possible for regular Hindus too to sometimes (and unwittingly) fall victim to rightist thoughts.

Pointing out to the existence of the CB will also ideally provide to us the opportunity to create a space for dialogue with those Hindus who while currently swayed by rightist thought, do so for reasons of not encountering the range of possible ways in which it is possible for a Catholic to be Goan and not a bigot. An entry in an email list that hosts a good amount of the diasporic CB presented an opportunity for us to explore such a space.

The message read as follows:

‘Goan people are very scared to speak out against the current regime for fear of reprisals. But thanks to the net and the various forums, whispers are turning into mighty words. In this regard one Goan medroso now relates the Naguesh Carmali freedom fighter story. It is believed that Carmali was a young and naive bystander at Lohia anti-Goa meeting in Margao. Like many Carmali was carregado by the police and taken to jail. Imagine this incident made Carmali a freedom fighter. Now for almost 50 years Carmaili is receiving money from the Goan taxpayers. He also got a good job in the communication media and his anti-social activities in Pangim have gone unpunished by the puppets of the current rulers.’

This discussion will not engage with the plethora of issues that this particular CB raises in his rather bizarre message. The sole focus will be with the manner in which this message relates to the person and history of Mr. Naguesh Karmali. Regular readers of this column will recollect that Mr. Karmali has been focused on by this column for the more extreme of his public activities on a number of occasions, so perhaps the contrast that the subsequent reflections will make the space for possible dialogue all the more clear.

In relation to Mr. Karmali, what is striking about the message is the absolute lack of sympathy for the young Naguesh. One may have any amount of disagreement with the older avatar and abhor his actions, but that should not necessarily preclude us from cultivating a sympathy for this earlier experiences and misfortunes. Indeed, it seems to be precisely this unjust treatment meted out to him, and his subsequent experiences in jail that have embittered Mr. Karmali. One need not sympathize with his shenanigans in Panjim and other parts of Goa; one can see these actions as an immature and unfair response to that earlier experience, but one can understand why he acts in this manner.

If one takes the message as gospel truth, then what is obvious from the scenario described is that an innocent Karmali was jailed by the late-colonial Portuguese regime. This says less about Karmali than it does about the late-colonial Portuguese regime. It was not above jailing and persecuting innocents in the course of maintaining its grip on the Portuguese people (and this included the Goans). This recognition is an important point in our challenge to CB imagination. It is an imagination that presents the Portuguese presence in Goa as blemishless, one long paradisiacal period of peace. This is not so.

To acknowledge this proposition however does not force us to conclude that the entire Portuguese period was one horrific nightmare. It leaves open for us the space to recognize that many of us were distinctly formed in that period and cherish the kind of persons we are now. It also does not prevent us from looking into other aspects of this period and holding it up as a politically charged model for challenge to the current state of the Goan democratic experience.

Ideally, one also imagines that our ability to recognize this violence and harm done to the likes of Mr. Karmali and others like him (he cannot have been the only innocent to be falsely arrested) opens up a space, however small, for dialogue with Mr. Karmali. Perhaps once convinced of our ability and willingness to be open about the varied experiences of; once convinced that we acknowledge his earlier unjustified suffering, we would actually be able to talk, rather than engage in street-side violence?

The Catholic bigot (admittedly an ideal type construction) is unable to see any ill in the period of Portuguese sovereignty over Goa. But this position is not necessarily shared by all Catholics, who for cultural reasons may see themselves associated in some manner with Portugal. To separate this chaff from the larger pile of wheat must be our continuous endeavour if we are to create spaces for dialogue with members of the Hindu right. After all, at the end of the day, the point is not to create concrete divisions and raise high walls, but to recognize that we share the same space and must learn to talk things out. If necessary, perhaps agree to disagree.

(First published in the Gomantak Times 2 March 2011)

The Monte Festival and how the Portuguese got it right

‘To many people in the official circles in Portugal,’ the informant whispered, ‘Goa is a bad word. They believe,’ he continued, ‘that they have burned their hands once too often.’ The reference was to the histrionics of this column’s favourites, the ‘freedom fighters’ and Hindu right-wing elements in Goa. But surely it takes two hands to clap? My own response was to fiercely (and somewhat triumphantly?) whisper back that ‘If they have burned their hands, it is because large sections of Portuguese officialdom have almost never gotten it right when dealing with Goa!’

This column has pointed out in earlier installations that the Portuguese nationalist element in fact supplements the Hindutva element in Goa as they work together (and always unwittingly) to screw things up in Goa.

To portray the ‘freedom fighters’ and the right wing elements as determined to protest every Portuguese event in Goa is not helpful. It is not helpful because by uniformly vilifying this group it shuts the space for dialogue. More importantly it prevents learning as to where we are making mistakes in the forging of a new post-colonial relationship between the two spaces. There have been some Portuguese sponsored events in Goa that have almost never been at the receiving end of negative attention from the champions of Hindutva. One such event is the annual Monte Music Festival conceptualized initially by Sergio Mascarenhas, then Delegate of the Fundação Oriente and supported by a host of local institutions.

This column has from time to time been charged with the mistake of over-reading issues, and this particular column may well possibly join that list of mistakes, but perhaps the risk is worth it. While the Hindutva gangs are a visceral threat to the people and peace of Goa, it is necessary to also see where they exercise restraint, so as to open up portals of understanding and dialogue.

When contacted personally after his participation in the episode where the visit of the Sagres was denounced in Vasco, one of the participants elaborated on the reason for his opposition. He pointed out that his opposition to the Sagres’ visit was motivated by the fact that the event of 1510 was sought to be commemorated by a unilateral celebration. There was no though given to a combined program that could revisit, or move on from 1510. The event required us only as audience, he suggested, not as equal participants. If the nature of his protest was entirely unacceptable, his observation was perhaps bang on target.

On this front the Monte Music Festival is a perfect example of what the Portuguese establishment could do to create a space for equal interaction. It does not unilaterally push ‘Portuguese culture’ but creates a platform where both ‘Indian’ and ‘European’ are put on proud display. Audiences for one genre, usually stay on for the performances of the other. The audience it creates then is the subject that Goan history has produced, an individual capable of transitioning between the worlds of the ‘East’ and the ‘West’.

The conceptualization of the Monte Music Festival used existing cliches of Goa as the ‘meeting space between the East and the West’ ‘Europe and India’. There is, it should be said, nothing wrong with clichés. As long as they do not suffocate other ways of thinking, they can be useful places to begin thinking from. The Monte festival is a wonderful example of how a cliché can be used to produce a valuable, and valued, cultural production. The problem however is when the cliché begins to limit rather than allow for elaboration. Thus for example, when we think of the ‘Indian’ segment of the Music festival, does it limit itself merely to India or to a wider ‘Indian’ sub-continental culture? The suggestion is that the Monte festival should actively think of including artistes and musicians from Pakistan and Bangladesh at the very least, if not from Nepal, and Afghanistan further afield. These spaces are not outside of the ‘Indian’ space. Not only do they share aspects of the same tradition, but continue to inflect the space of ‘Indian’ classical traditions. Consider for a moment, the fact that while actors from ‘Hindi’ films are wildly popular in Pakistan, a good number of Pakistani musicians and rock bands are wildly popular in India Republic. One particularly interesting example would be the productions from the Coke Studio in Pakistan. This project melds the ‘traditional’ classical traditions of Pakistan, with a range of contemporary and ‘western’ musical instruments and arrangements.

To make this suggestion of border-crossing to the Monte festival should not be seen as radical. The Western music presentations at the festival have often crossed political borders within Europe, and also presented, from time to time, American artistes specializing in ‘European’ classical music. To extend such political blindness to the Indian subcontinent would only go to enrich the offerings and value of the Monte festival.

Dialogue, it will be agreed, is much preferable to the option of standing on our little soap boxes and carving out audiences with defined boundaries. We are too small a people to be carved out into fields desired by the Hindutvawadis, and Catholic bigots. To recognize a point our ideological opponent is making could help toward emasculating the brigands on both sides and create more space for dialogue. After all, as the Monte festival annually indicates, dialogue creates such wonderful mo(ve)ments.

(This post was first published in the Gomantak Times 9 Feb 2011)

Two cases in Calcutta

A tale of two cases and two options…

This column is being written immediately on my return from Delhi, where I spent the time between the last column and this. My stay in Delhi was to enable my presence at the inaugural conference of the Law and Social Sciences Research Network held between the 8th and the 11th at the Jawaharlal Nehru University.

While present at the conference, the participants were made aware of a rather interesting story. This true story involves the case of one Hans Dembowski, who subsequent to his research and the award of a PhD degree published a book, via the Oxford University Press titled Taking the State to Court – Public Interest Litigation and the Public Sphere in Metropolitan India. This book was concerned with the issue of governance in metropolitan India, and sought to elaborate the manner in which the Indian courts are playing a vital role in making public institutions more accountable.

Unfortunately for him however, two lawyers of Calcutta High Court, one of them being a government pleader, initiated a contempt petition before the Calcutta High court stating that the book contains "scurrilous derogatory and scandalous remarks against this Hon'ble Court" and has "scandalized and/or tended to lower the Authority of this court". Acting on this petition, the Calcutta High Court in an interim order ensured that the national and international circulation of the book was stopped. Dembowski hangs in limbo ever since.

Closer home, just prior to my departure from Goa, I was made aware of another petition that had been accepted and acted upon by the High Court of Calcutta. This one is a petition filed by Fomento Industries against Seby Rodrigues, where Fomento, represented by Sujay Gupta, former editor of Gomantak Times and now in the employ of Fomento claimed it was being defamed by Seby. Among the other prayers to the Court, Fomento made to the Calcutta High Court was a claim of Rs. 500 crores from Seby for the damages caused by the blog http://mandgoa.blogspot.com/ that he manages.

The admission of both these petitions by the Calcutta High Court is rather disturbing, since it really amounts to participation in a suffocation of the rights of debate and discussion. In the first case what the interim order represents is a suffocation of the right to academic debate. In the second, in terms framed by Pravin Sabnis, what we have is in fact an assault on the rights of a journalist, a person who documents social processes.

The question that emerges in both cases is, is there something desperately wrong with India’s judicial processes and institutions? Does one suffocate the circulation of an eminently academic work that raises questions and honestly seeks answers and promotes debate? Should the Calcutta High Court have taken up an issue that could, and perhaps should have, ideally been dealt with in Goa? Initiated a process without the participation of the defendant?

As a socio-legal scholar other questions also flood my mind. What is the relationship that a superior court of this country ought to have with procedure? Is it procedure alone that a Court like the High Court of Calcutta must bear in mind, or must its imagination also be animated by some knowledge of, and a respect for the workings of society?

Attending the public meeting in response to the defamation suit filed by Fomento, one got a sense of the workings of this society. A society that is in fact not working. A society that is simply not in communication within itself.

Did Fomento in fact initiate a dialogue with Seby prior to filing this suit in the High Court of Calcutta? Was this dialogue attested to by some form of written communication? Ideally, Fomento ought to have; in such a case displaying its commitment to an open society, and arming itself against the now widely prevalent accusations that it is seeking to harass an activist who is raising valid questions about the nature of mining in Goa.

For all the challenges that Goa has been dealing with, every challenge is an opportunity for dialogue. Unfortunately it seems that at almost every turn, this opportunity is being rejected in favour of the legal; a route that is really in confrontation with the social.

(Published in the Gomantak Times 14 Jan 2009)