Letters from Portugal: Embracing the Philippine heritage

If you were travel up to north India, say to cities like Lucknow, or Agra, and had conversations with the ‘small’ folk, or just people who had lived for generations, and whose lives did not involve some kind of grand rupture, you would hear references to a Rani Todiya, or Mallka Todiya. Rani Todiya is used by such folk, as a marker of time; invariably of the good old days, when things were cheap, when life was simpler, when there was a rule of law. What is interesting however, is that these folk are not referring to some Satyayug deity, but of the Queen-Empress Victoria; the Victoria being compressed to Todiya. What is interesting about this term for Victoria is that not only is her reign the marker for the good times, but it is also evidence of the manner in which she had been internalized. Not only was her name transformed into a vernacular form, but her position in society, as ‘their’ or ‘our’ Queen, was also to a large extent internalized. The Empress Victoria reigned over an entire psycho-social edifice, an edifice that transcended the seven seas, incorporating native-rulers, castes, panchayats, producing in this manner, the British Raj. The Raj to that extent was very ‘Indian’, as much as Rani Todiya was our queen. This may come as a surprise for those who have been raised on the nationalist intellectual frameworks in use in schools. Frameworks that suggest to us, that there was always an ‘us’ and a ‘them’ between the British and the Indians. What these frameworks forget to mention however, is that when Todiya was made our Queen, it was not just she who had a right over us, but as is necessary in any form of kingship, we too had a claim on our kings (and queens).

In a similar manner then, what we in Goa, given the spectacular disinclination to teach our history in schools, have largely forgotten, is that in addition to claiming the Portuguese kings and queens as our own, we can also rightfully lay claim to three Spanish kings. From 1580 until 1640, the Portuguese crown was united with the Spanish crown, allowing for two separate kingdoms, but just one King; a situation that ran its course under the three Hapsburg Phillips of Spain.

With such a history in mind, the Goan traveling in Europe has not merely a Portuguese link with that continent, but larger European link. When traveling in the Netherlands, one thinks not merely of the Dutch opponents of the early Estado da India Portuguesa, but also of the fact that the Netherlands were once upon-a-time part of the Hapsburg domains. Domains lost in the course of the wars that broke out in the continent in the course of the Reformation. Similarly, when one travels to the one-time imperial capital of Toledo in Spain, one does not start when one sees those large double-headed eagles clutching the arms of the Hapsburg kings in their talons. On the contrary, the emotion that one is faced with is that of pleasant surprise when encountering the familiar. For did we not already see this motif in Old Goa, proudly recording the sovereignty of Phillip, king of all of Iberia?

The journey to Portugal was not, as this column so often points out, to reconstruct some empty colonial saudadismo with regard to Portugal. On the contrary, the trip to Portugal was to figure out if there were other ways in which our relation to this country could be rearticulated in a contemporary context. This contemporary context would not include only the examination of the manner in which we can relate as South Asians, members of the Indian ocean world, and as Indians, to Portugal.  This movement would also mean embracing its complex (sometimes obscured) histories and giving them new relevance and meaning. In the course of this embrace, we are not bound to the nationalist interpretations of this history that the Portuguese may feel obliged to produce. On the contrary, we can legitimately rewrite this history from our own point of view. Embracing this history, making it genuinely our own, allows us, in the manner that Mallka Todiya was claimed by her Indian subjects, allows us to make similar claims on the heritage of the Philippine emperors. This claim of inheritance should not ofcourse only be narrowly read, or shortsightedly utilized, but more properly embraced, so that we effectively become citizens of the world, a marked characteristic of the Goan (often an emigrant into this large world).

Some may find this suggestion of embracing an Imperial heritage, especially by former subjects of the Empire, problematic. There is no denying that such an embrace is problematic. However, we should recognize that this embrace, while possibly problematic, also comes with its fair share of empowerment. It allows the contemporary resident of the global South, to go to foreign lands, in the knowledge that these lands that must today be crafted into home, were in earlier times, also home. This embrace also allows us to transcend the binaries of 'us' and 'them' and recognize commonalities that unite us outside of the frames that we normally use to see ourselves; constructing in this manner a common humanity.

Speaking of embracing this larger heritage, and seeing ourselves outside of the frames we normally use, most people would be surprised to realize that urinating on the street is not particularly a crass Indian habit. All too often, one is apt to find contemporary descendants of Philippine subjects, be they male or female, easing themselves on the streets, especially late at night over the course of the weekend. Come to think of it, this is not, and was not a practice unfamiliar in the former realm of good Rani Todiya either!  Some uncommon embraces it appears, can engender uncommon perspectives.

(A version of this post was first published in the O Heraldo on 22 June 2012)

Picketing the Revolution: 'Their' Revolution, Our Democracy and a Fascist Imagination

Portugal’s Carnation Revolution was a significant moment in global history because it marked the simultaneous liberation of both colonizers and colonized from dictatorial power. With the fall of the Salazarist regime, the Portuguese people were able to move into a system of democratic governance. At the same time the African colonies of Portugal saw a halt to the Portuguese colonial wars and were born into independent sovereign existence. For India the fall of the Salazarist regime saw Portugal recognize India’s claims over Goa. There is very little to protest therefore, at least from an Indian nationalist and standard anti-colonialist point of view.

It was for these reasons that the presence of a screaming mob from the Hindu Janajagruthi Samiti outside the Instituto Camoes in Panjim was something of a mystery to those attending the celebrations on the twenty-fourth.

To unravel this mystery we need to refer to the news report by the Navhind Times dated the twenty-fifth of April. The report indicates that earlier in the day a bunch of ‘freedom fighters’ led by Naguesh Karmali had approached the Vice-Chancellor of the Goa University demanding to know why the University was involved in the celebrations. These freedom fighters argued that “celebration of the national events of Portugal in Goa [are] an insult to the sentiments of freedom fighters as well as people…who fought for the Liberation of Goa from colonial rule”. To suggest why even the commemoration of an anti-colonial moment in Portugal’s history could nevertheless be odious to the Goan people, Karmali indicated that “those persons, who were active part of Portuguese dictatorship under Salazar regime, became integral part of democratic governance in that country after 1974 by sidelining the Communist, whose role in the Portuguese Revolution was undisputed”.

Karmali has never been known for logic, and this time his logic is just plain bizarre! It is clear that all he is trying to do is demonize Portugal and the Portuguese people. In the eyes of Karmali, the eyes through which he would like all Goans to see history and Portugal, the Portuguese are irredeemable. They are, forever evil, and we should sever all ties with Portugal. Karmali would be least concerned with the Portuguese however, if it were not for people in Goa who wish to continue having links with the Portuguese. It is these people that irk him the most, and it is really the links of these people with Portugal that he would like sever. “[V]arious activities previously held in Goa and linked to the erstwhile Portuguese rule as well as culture of that country, have a certain community as their focus, and are aimed toward creating a divide in Goan society”.

It sounds as if Karmali is suggesting, though admittedly not openly saying so, that it is the Goan Catholics that harbour a fondness for the Portuguese. Thankfully, we know this suggestion to be factually incorrect. A good number of the students at the Instituto bear such surnames as Tari, Chari, Khaunte, Bhobhe, Kamat, Pai, Vernekar, Amonkar, Naik. The students at the Instituto increasingly come from a variety of social and religious backgrounds making Karmali’s statements meaningless. As such we should study Karmali’s statements not for the community he means, but for the community he seeks to create, and the company he keeps.

Interestingly at the demonstration on the evening of the twenty-fourth, Karmali himself was not present. This seems to correspond to a larger pattern emerging in India, where the violent positions are by and large taken by lower-caste groups belong to such outfits as the Bajrang Dal, Shri Ram Sene, Hindu Janajagruthi Samithi, while the BJP, largely composed of upper-castes and the anglicized, toes the moderate line and makes soft, polite noises of disapproval. Nevertheless we should see both groups as acting in concert, playing that age-old game of ‘Good Cop – Bad Cop’. When the BJP is seen as the only group that can control these louts, it makes sense to the average citizen, to elect the BJP so that these elements are kept in place.

The demonstration outside the Instituto should be seen not as a peaceful demonstration but an active attempt to intimidate, both Goan citizens of India, as well as the Portuguese institutions in Goa. Cultural aspects apart, the systematic picketing and threatening of Portuguese related cultural events in Goa, should and must be seen as an attempt to hound the Portuguese institutions out of Goa.

If this is the intention, what possibly motivates this action?

On the cultural front, we do not have to fear that the Goan Catholic culture will die if we loose a link with Portugal. Large portions of the Goan Catholic have also had a robust relationship with British-India and the English-language cultures. These cultures, as well as the Konkani cultures of the Goan Catholic are throbbing with life; destruction of a Portuguese link would be a setback, but it will not destroy them.

The attempt of Karmali and gang is culturally much more serious than hitting out at the Goan Catholic. It attempts to create a collective forgetting of the Goan past. This forgetting will impact not just Catholics, but Hindus and Muslims as well, and their relations with each other. A good portion of the Goan past, its relation with the subcontinent, and the world, a full four hundred and fifty years of it, including commentaries on the past before this, is documented in Portuguese. Block the renewed cultural relations with Portugal and the Portuguese language and you will ensure the death of that heritage, and memory of those histories in Goa. Once that history is effectively unavailable, you open the doors for the rewriting of Goan history, to fill it with the poppycock that the Hindu Right excels at.

We already have a good amount of popular commentary, spinning myths and tales about the Goan past, passing off as history. The roots of this scenario could, I believe, be traced to the drought that hit Goa subsequent to Liberation and until diplomatic relations between Portugal and India were resumed after the April Revolution. During this time, access to Portugal was limited to a select few alone. When facts are unavailable, fantasy floods in. With the resuming of relations, access to Portuguese culture has become much more democratic, and it is this liberation from restrictions that bothers the Rightist groups in Goa. The more people can access information independently, the less they need mediators. It is this democracy that the Karmali and gang fear desperately, and it our imagination of the past, and our options for the future that they seek to control.

It’s funny, but celebrating their revolution, seems to have helped us flush out the fascists in our midst. 25 de Abril Sempre! (April 25 Forever).

(Published in the Gomantak Times 28 April 2009)