After Bombay...

In the name of security our State could now take liberties with our…Liberty

Among the many stories that the Puranas contain, one tells us of the mythical churning of the ocean of milk. A task taken up by the Gods and the Demons, the process released a host of products, good and beneficial; and the bad and harmful. The violent episode in Bombay will perhaps be assigned a similar status in the mythology of the early 21^st Indian century. An event of significant proportions, it has and will no doubt continue to, release both the good and the bad, even as its significance will either blown out of proportion, or sought to be placed in context.

Among those seeking to blow the event out of proportion are the forces of the Right, of which most of the news media are proving to be the vanguard. They argue that the episode in Bombay constitutes India’s 9/11. Amitav Ghosh in an op-ed in the New York Times has convincingly argued that we should dismiss this hype. The event was painful, but not 9/11, since the number of dead in NYC far exceeded those killed, and unlike the US, India has seen large massacres of the kind we saw in Bombay. (We cannot forget the massacres of Partition; the anti-Sikh riots; the anti-Muslim pogroms, most significantly those in Gujarat; the violence against Christians most recently; the displacement of tribal and rural peoples sometimes twice in a single generation; and never for a moment forgetting the daily violence visited on India’s dalit peoples). To put this event in perspective, a great number of persons have written essays and comments, indicating that while the violence and death that Bombay saw was shocking and calls for soul searching, we have to also remember that in addition to this violence, the vast multitude of India’s citizens suffer daily terror attacks, most often than not from the forces of their own State.

The desire to pin down the carnage in Bombay as India’s 9/11 speaks of at least two tendencies. The first, as already suggested, is to blow this one event entirely out of proportion. This desire stems primarily from the shock value that must necessarily be drummed up if television channels are to hold us enthralled, even as they continue to beam advertisements and whet our appetite for continued consumption. The bottom line basically reads; No drama, no consumption!

The other more disturbing tendency is the desire to use this event to demand for war on Pakistan, harsher laws for ‘terrorists’, and greater security and surveillance. Goa has seen a number of meetings hysterically demanding war on Pakistan. While we cannot ignore these calls, we are better served dismissing these calls, and sending these ‘patriots’ off to the loony bin for at least two reasons. The fools have no real clue what war means, and are highly unlikely to even serve if this war is initiated. Secondly, India is better served encouraging the democratic forces in Pakistan now struggling to recover from a military dictatorship. If the fool-hardy invasion of Iraq (and other countries by the US) has taught us anything, it is that invasions entirely preclude the possibility of encouraging the establishment of a democratic polity.

If this first demand does not (if we are lucky) materialize, it appears that the second and the third options most certainly will. The sensationalist media coverage that milked this tragedy has indicated that the Indian powder-puff elite are quite willing to allow for the setting up of a police state, if it will allow them to continue to live their ivory-tower (read 8-storey apartment building) existence. Indeed, as the differences between the ultra-rich and the poor in India grow wider, we will need more and more policing to maintain a semblance of law and order in this country.

A concerted effort is on right now to convince the average citizen that she is better off with harsher anti-terror laws and greater surveillance. Nothing could be further from the truth. The average citizen stands only to loose from this new-found security obsession. Greater powers to the police, harsher anti-terror laws and greater surveillance allow police and military force unrestricted power over suspects. It is not the terrorist that is the subject of most of these laws, but the suspect. As our experience in a number of recent cases has shown, all too often the suspect turns out innocent. Take for example the almost 100 odd people rounded up in Chimbel and Vasco. What was their crime? Nothing! They were rounded up merely on suspicion and not carrying identity papers. The harsher laws that are being called for really amount to an invitation for the abuse of human rights, and a persecution of citizens who are often time raising valid grievances.

The heightened security and surveillance that we see building up around us, are at the end of the day, useless and pointless. They serve only an aesthetic function; they assure us that we are being looked after. The price for this feeling, is the giving up of our freedoms. Take the example of the recently concluded IFFI. Post Bombay security was beefed up, but it was still possible for a host of people to slip inside of the festival arena without flashing their delegate card. The real impact of these efforts become clearer if one realizes that in the US of A and Europe, despite bomb scares and attacks, people are still allowed to walk in and out of airports, unlike in India, where a valid ticket holder is for some strange reason prevented from leaving the airport terminal once she has gotten in. what purpose does this serve? No logical reason, except to enforce a general paranoia, control the citizen, and show them that the State is in control. The exercise in Chimbel and Vasco represent the efforts of an ineffectual and illegitimate Government trying to pretend that it has everything under control. Since the persons rounded up are ‘small people’ no one is really going to complain.

The security of the people of India are better served if we pull our collective heads out of the sands we have stuck them in and question the State of our Republic. Is the average citizen truly being served by the State? Or is the State merely securing the interests of a small segment of the population? Why are there angry protests all over India, demanding not a harsh state, but a state that provides employment, that does not gobble up livelihood resources? What is the Indian State doing to ensure that minority groups ranging from Mulism, Christian to Dalit feel secure in a country that seems increasingly to not care about their security?

It is when we answer these questions, and redress the grievances of the majority of India’s population, that we will be able to stem the tide of violence that is continuing to grow in our country.

(Published in the Gomantak Times, December 11, 2008)

Another Film Festival: Random Notes from the Goan Peoples’ Film Festival

Forgive me if I sound triumphalist over the successful conclusion of the Panjim leg of the Goan Peoples’ Film Festival. The Festival was held to protest the silence with which the Goan State has been treating the various memoranda and questions of the Ganv Ghor Rakhon Manch (GGRM) pertaining to the continuing rise of speculative real-estate projects, and the State’s lack of commitment to participatory planning that is the first demand of the Goan people.


The Festival was accomplished under handicaps of various sorts. The first of these was that of time. We contemplated this move of drawing attention to the abuses of the Goan State (and administration) only on the fifth of November. And yet despite this late decision the response that we had from people both in Goa and the rest of India was overwhelming. While the support in Goa was understandable, it was the support from India that was truly heart-warming. Directors from across the country, at a moment’s notice couriered films to us, sending messages of support and solidarity. If one of the aims of the Festival was to draw Indian attention to the Goan struggle, then in some measure the Festival succeeded in drawing national attention to our cause.


The relationship between India and Goa was one that featured in some of the discussions at the Festival. There were some, myself included, who feel that the dominant relationship between India and Goa is in fact a colonial one. It is a colonial relationship when it comes to viewing Goa as a holiday destination (India’s holiday state as NDTV once put it) for the country; and as another space for exploitation (of mineral resources) where the voices of the local people don’t really matter.


And yet these voices, didn’t call for a Goan nationalism, but rather an articulation of a healthier relationship with India, based on democratic and constitutional norms. To do this however, we recognized that we will have to rearticulate not only the manner in which the Goan economy is currently structured, but also the mythologies of our State.


When speaking of restructuring mythologies, it was suggested that we also need to think in terms of restructuring geography. It is not just in Portuguese-Indian mythology that Goa is seen as a land apart. The whole Parashuram myth also sees Goa, as the land beyond the end. New (and this emphasis on ‘new’ needs to be noted) land that was created for invaders (migrants?) from the North. Mythologies of other groups would show us connections of the land we now call Goa, with Bijapur, with the Deccan and the Kanara coast, that link us in organic ways with India. Routes that don’t push us into self-isolating insularity.


Another way we can connect with the India, along democratic and constitutional norms, is in finding our own voice, among the voices of resistance in India. The insular position that Goa (and Goan causes) find themselves in, is also the result of a certain patriarchal provincialism that sees nothing in common with Goa. As such, one heard the question, but what do these documentaries have to do with Goa? The answer was aptly given by Ramesh Gauns after watching Rakesh Sharma’s ‘Aftershocks: The Rough Guide to Democracy’ that dealt with the fate of villagers displaced to allow for lignite mining. “I felt I was watching not Gujarat but Goa!” Ramesh Gauns would know what he is talking about he has been at the mining issue for a while now.


Yet another parallel between the Indian experience and the Goan, came across after watching ‘India Untouched: Stories of a People Apart’. The film dealt with the experiences of Dalits across various parts of India. Dadu Mandrekar, another persistent voice, this one dealing with Dalit issues, was visibly moved by the film. It is a mistake to presume that we in Goa do not suffer from the kinds of violences that are meted out to Dalits in other parts of India. These do exist, but are very effectively silenced. It is possible that these violences may be limited to small sections of our territory but the daily experience of humiliation by upper-castes is an undeniable fact. And at the end of the day, who am I to judge if your humiliation is greater to or less than the humiliation of some other person. Humiliation is humiliation, period.


Engaging with the resistance in India, will allow us in Goa to nuance the arguments that we present to the opposition here in Goa. It will open up newer options for us, options that we in our small society, oftentimes dare not dream of.


The smallness of our society was cause for another one of the handicaps that the Festival had to deal with. ‘Why do you want to do it alongside IFFI?’ ‘Are you hosting a parallel film festival?” “Why! What will the Government say?” Indeed, one of the supporters to the Festival threatened to pull out at the last moment fearing a souring of their relationship with the State if they helped in hosting a parallel film festival.


These responses and the fear of this particular supporter speaks volumes about the Goan state-society relationship. We are willing to go only so far and no further in offending the State and threatening the socio-economic elites that support and benefit from it. It is the size of the Goan territory and its elite that allows this almost tyrannical situation to continue. Tyrannical because when no one is willing to break the conspiracy of silence, tyranny is the only situation that comes to mind. Once more it is in joining forces with a larger Indian resistance to State, corporate and elite tyranny, that we in Goa stand a better chance.


The Goan Peoples’ Film Festival ended its screenings in Panjim yesterday, and will now reconvene in Colva to allow the dialogue initiated in Panjim to continue. If you are even vaguely interested in the issues on the boil in Goa, you would do well to visit the Festival!

(Published in the Gomantak Times, 26th Nov 2008)

The Regional Plan and Terrorism

Goan Activists will be the likely target for the proposed ATS

A certain sense of jubilation accompanied the reporting of the proposed establishment of an Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) in the State. “The state could have its own anti-terrorism squad in a short while with the police almost finalizing a proposal for the same, said police officials on Sunday” read one newspaper reporting this imminent occurrence. One can almost hear the anticipated gushing response from the reader. “What! Our very own ATS! Wow! Fantastic Man! Hurray!”

Those excited by the prospect of an ATS in our own State need to take a sober view of the whole issue. They need to inquire into what exactly the ATS will be used for, and what is the exact form of this terrorism that we are being is told is “likely” to target our home state. What we should not forget in the euphoria of setting up of the ATS, is that surveillance and increased security measures and forces invariably mean the reduction of democratic space within the State, increased control over the citizenry by the State and a reduction of normal processes of law to give extraordinary powers to the police, very often allowing a free hand for human rights abuse.

“Terrorist groups have targeted the nation and this probably forced the state police to ask for its own ATS” reads the same report on the squad. Let us ignore for this moment the entire discussion possible around the bogey of (Islamic) terrorism in India, and train our sights a little closer home. I refer you to page 79 of the Draft Regional Plan. On this page the Draft Regional Plan reads “growing organized activism typical of a small but well-informed state and also more than a normal share of VVIP movements add to problems in policing....Thus Goa has as large a range of crime typologies as Mumbai or Chennai”.

The Regional Plan is effectively equating the “growing organized activism” emerging from a “small but well-informed state” as a policing problem! In other words the Goan citizen-activist is an embryonic criminal/ terrorist! It is here, in the pages of the supposedly pro-people Regional Plan that we should locate the possible reason for the setting up of the ATS in the State.

Given that activism in Goa is blocking the irresponsible deployment of significant amounts of capital, especially in the mining and real-estate industry; we should not be surprised that industry and state have begun to consider the activist a criminal and incipient terrorist. The signs of course have been in the air for quite some time now. The harassing of activists, and the more recent physical abuse that some of them have had to encounter. The framework has already been set in place with the political elite drumming out the refrain that the Goan has become negative. To explain away this negativity, they are denying the fact that it is the average citizen who is standing up and protesting. They deny this fact and go on to indicate that it is the activist who is leading the people astray.

I had earlier pointed out that increased security measures and forces invariably mean the reduction of democratic space within the State. It is this situation that I am referring to. The justified concerns of the people are not being addressed, on the contrary, they are being targeted as terrorists, and this targeting has in fact already begun. The ATS will just be icing on the cake.

The comment in the Regional Plan also drives home another truth regarding the war on terror; terrorists are produced as a result of not addressing the valid issues of the people, and also by actively labeling activists as terrorists. When they eventually do take up armed revolt, it is entirely the result of frustration with a non-responsive State. Else, you just find someone who is annoying you, squat them down like they were a fly, and justify your irritation by calling them terrorists. The fake encounters in the Batla House case are a perfect example. The boys killed in the ‘encounter’ were shot at point blank range, hardly an encounter killing.

What is more troubling though is that this errant phrase in the Regional Plan seems to have slipped in without the awareness of the experts on the Task Force. I had occasion to raise this issue in a public forum where one member of the Task Force, and one bureaucrat intimately involved with Regional Plan were present. Both of them were blissfully unaware of the presence of this phrase in the Regional Plan!

Now this means one of two things. Either these two gents did not read the Regional Plan cover to cover and blindly affixed signature to the document; or that they did read the text, and thought nothing of labeling the Goan citizen-activist a possible criminal. In the case of the first scenario, one wonders how much of the Regional Plan is just a result of blind copy-pasting, and how much the result of application of mind and debate by the Task Force members. On the other hand, if the Task Force members have in fact read the document from cover to cover, perhaps they will provide the people of Goa with written justification as to why they have treated the Goan citizen-activist with such total contempt? If they are unable to do so, then what is called for is an immediate retraction of the errant phrase by the State, and a public apology to the people of Goa. Nevertheless with every reading, the Draft Regional Plan sinks into further disrepute.

In the context of the Goan upheaval, that shows no sign of abating thanks to a largely silent and criminally-complicit political class, the setting up on an ATS in the State, in the background of the national environment (where innocents are branded terrorist) and statements in the Draft Regional Plan, does not augur well for the state of democracy in Goa.

(Published in the Gomantak Times 19th November 2008)

A Right to Public Comment?

How to have an effective say in the draft Regional Plan

The announcement of the period of public comment on the Draft Regional Plan 2021 gives us the space to raise a number of rather interesting questions about the whole process of public comment. What exactly do we mean by public comment? What should constitute public notice? And does the state have any obligations in aiding the articulation of public comment?

The Task Force apparently prevailed on the Government to allow for not the usual 60 days period for public comment, but a period of 90 days, three months for the public to comment. The Task Force no doubt had good intentions, but it is my contention that this extension of time alone will not serve the purpose of greater public participation. At the most, without being tied to a genuine rethinking of the whole process, it will remain a mere token gesture while the game continues to be played as always.

The Draft Regional Plan was apparently notified on the 8th of October 2008 via the government gazette. Some amount of the population got to know of it a few weeks later via newspaper reports. When these good citizens got to know about it, they rushed to the relevant offices and asked for their copy of the draft plan and the maps pertaining to their village (prohibitively priced for an average citizen by the way). The answers they received was in the ‘they are not ready yet, come back next week’ range. Close to a month after notification, a good number of Panchayats have not yet received copies of the plan and the maps pertaining to their jurisdiction. If such is the case, can we seriously argue that the period of public comment has begun? Or is this just another perfunctory exercise, where we move through a ritual and say “hurray, we did it!” and move along with out any genuine public debate?

To understand the ridiculousness of this practice of publishing prospective legal change in a gazette and presuming that the period of public comment has begun we need to look into the beginnings of modern democracy; where the checks on the powers that be, came from a powerful bourgeois (commercial and business) class that demanded it have a say and stake in the running of the state. For this class, unfettered with daily menial chores of the working class, discovering the joys of the print media, and encountering a world with familiar limited issues, obtaining information via a newspaper, or the odd governmental gazette was perfectly convenient. Democracy in the old republican model comprised a club of a small group of gentlemen who debated issues over tea. Information from the newspaper you had all day to pour over, and the club to discuss issues over, allowed for a fair amount of participation in governance. Goa under the Portuguese Republican regime provides us an appropriate example. It gave to a small class of Goans this taste of democracy, and for this little club, it was a very satisfying experience indeed.

Democracy has since moved on though. It has itself been subjected to democratic urges, and democracy today is also the space for the working class and the rural peasant. These groups are finally demanding not merely technical compliance, but effective communication, to allow for genuine participatory governance. If the Government (and indeed the well-meaning Task Force) is serious, it will ensure that the period of public comment begins not from publication in the gazette, but from the moment the Regional Plan in entirety descends to every Panchayat in the state of Goa. If not, lets take it as fact that the Government is not really serious about this participatory exercise.

There is another question that emerges though, when we recognize that the forms of the law are geared toward a privileged class that inaugurated the first phase of democracy. When we say open for public comment, who exactly is this public? Theorists of popular culture inform us that there is no such thing as a ready-made and existing public. A public has to be created. And definite kinds of public are created through definite kinds of contexts. What is the kind of public that these public comment provisions create therefore?

The sad truth is that the Regional Plan does not really bother with identifying the public that needs to comment, or indeed enable it to be in a position where it can effectively comment. In the case of the Regional Plan, the public resides in the gram sabhas and municipalities of the state. Creating the public therefore would require the State to actively convene special assemblies where the technical details of the Plan are explained to this public. Only subsequent to this process, can we effectively say that a period of public comment has in fact begun.

This proposed process may seem ridiculous to those who accept the current procedures as sufficient. But if we agree that the current procedures are insufficient and incapable of enabling genuine participation, then clearly there is a need to move towards more effective procedures. Such renewed forms of participation alone will allow us to move back from the precipice of populism that the Indian democracy has moved to.

To carry forward the idea that form determines content, have reference to the phrasing of the law that invites the public objections to a government proposal. The phrasing ensures that the ‘public’ is eternally trapped in the role of the objector. There is nothing positive that this public has to say, since they are objecting. Even if it is a positive assertion that this public makes, the phrasing ensures that the bureaucracy looks at the public comment as an objection to all the blood, sweat and tears that they may have poured into the proposal. In asking for objections, what we have effectively done is to minimize the space for dialogue (which marks a democracy) and set up two sparring partners.

There are good many aspects of the law that are based on a liberal and bourgeois understanding of the world. A law rooted in these notions is no good for a democracy composed largely of labouring classes. The ongoing upheaval in Goa is a perfect route for us to examine these notions, change them and work towards effective democracy and social stability. Towards this larger end, challenging the period of public comment on the draft Regional Plan, would be an effective first step. The period of public comment can logically and ethically begin only when every panchayat and municipality in the State has received the relevant documents, and only after an initial explanation of the features and the proposals of the Regional Plan have been explained in all these bodies. If this is not done, then we would have had no effective realization of our right to Public comment.

(Published in the Gomantak Times 5th November 2008)

Debating Free Speech

What are the limits to the Freedom of Speech and Expression?

Subsequent to my earlier column, a complaint was presented via a letter to the editor, that my column, which denounced the “We Shall Overcome” rally for allowing Manohar Parrikar to speak at the public meeting displayed to the world, my “pretentious belief in freedom of speech”. This complaint offered an alternate point of view “I (said that author of the complaint) deplore and condemn the viciously divisive and dangerous ideology of the Right (namely the Hindu fundamentalist groups), but to suppress anyone's right to express himself/herself as a citizen of Goa is doing exactly what the Right have done in similar circumstances when in power. We are not like that!”

To my mind, this argument is facile, but more importantly rests on certain principles of Liberalism, that are deeply flawed and allow for such facile and eventually dangerous assertions.

The principles of Liberalism presume that all citizens are equal. Indeed the letter to the editor says as much, we “cannot suppress anyone's right to express himself/herself as a citizen of Goa”. But this is where the Liberal vision betrays shortcomings. We may ideally like to presume that citizen’s are equal, but the fact is that they are not. There are some citizens who are, whether we like it or not, more powerful than others. This is one of the greatest problems of Liberalism. It fails to recognize the operations of various kinds of power that effectively render one citizen more equal than the other. Failing to recognize this difference in power, then allows us to make the facile argument, that preventing someone to speak at a public meeting is a suppression of the right to speech and expression. The person in question here is the leader of the Opposition! Are we seriously trying to suggest that the Leader of the Opposition, in this case the voluble and slick media-charmer Mr. Manohar Parrikar has a lack of space to express his opinion? A case of suppression of his right to speech would emerge only when the rally at Azad Maidan was in fact, his only way to get his ideas across. In such a case preventing him to speak would have definitely been a violation of this fundamental right. Clearly though this is not the case. On the contrary, in keeping with this noble sentiment of allowing citizens of Goa to speak, the floor could (and should) have been yielded to those who rarely, if ever, get an opportunity to speak. And there were people at Azad Maidan rally, who wished to speak, but were not given opportunity. So much for standing up for the Freedom of Speech.

What if Mr. Parrikar had not been Leader of the Opposition, but an average citizen, bereft of such power? Would we be justified in preventing him to speak at a public meeting like the “We Shall Overcome” rally at Azad Maidan? I would argue we would be based on two criteria. The first would be the extent of our right to expression, and the second would be context.

What is the limit of our right to expression? Can we allow for hate speech and what my critic acknowledges is Mr. Parrikar’s “viciously divisive and dangerous ideology” under the guise of Right to Speech and Expression? I don’t believe that we need to argue the obvious! Clearly hate speech and the deliberate inflaming of communal passions cannot be allowed the respectability that comes from a public platform that “We Shall Overcome” was meant to be.

But this barring of speech is not (and cannot be) a blanket ban on expression. Clearly there must be spaces where even a fascist must be allowed to speak. This is where the second criteria of context comes in. A public meeting like ‘We Shall Overcome’ is of a form which does not allow debate. One cannot respond to the hate speech, condemn it and point out its flaws. This for two reasons. First, such a meeting is one where speakers randomly come up and speak, and there is no systematic exploration of an idea or of an agenda. The hate speech then, can go uncontested and unchallenged. The second reason is the form of the gathering itself. Such rallies (and not just ‘We Shall Overcome’) gather potential mobs. This audience will gather up the stimuli and by nature of the form of the meeting, is actively prevented from reasoning out the stimuli presented to it. Clearly then, if one knows a person to be a fascist, and is aware of her/his divisive intentions, one can prevent him/her from speaking at such a public rally.

The audience at a debating club or a discussion group is an entirely different order. People gather here for the specific reason of encountering ideas, and then evaluating them to the core. To prevent an average citizen who expounds “viciously divisive and dangerous ideology” from speaking at such an audience, would I agree, be a violation of the right to free speech. The problem with fascists however, is that they very rarely enter into such groups and address such audiences. They prefer mass rallies, where they can insert hate into minds, where they can hijack agendas and meetings. Or they prefer private discussions where they are not really open to debate, but are merely bludgeoning you with their ideas.

In conclusion then, one has the right to free speech, when one is following the rules of the game, where respect for the other is present. Talking to a mute(d) audience is not the space for the right to hate speech. In such events, one has the right to block hate speech in contexts where the recipient of the argument is not allowed to pause, reflect and talk back. This is why context is so important when we discuss and debate rights. To not give the audience this right is in fact to participate in an assault on their rights (to speech, expression and multiple others).

(Published in the Gomantak Times 29 October 2008)

[For those who follow the blog, you would know that the nameless critic in this column is Dr.Oscar Rebello. I chose to leave him nameless in the column because i believe that Oscar is representative of a larger way of thinking. The issue therefore is not necessarily with Oscar, with who I may continue to have differences, but with a larger issue about the meaning of democracy and the extent of rights.]

Treating suspicious minds

[What follows is a letter to the Editor by Dr. Oscar Rebello, responding to my last column. The letter appeared in the Gomantak Times dt. Oct 25 2008]

I was amused to peruse the chaotic ramblings of Jason Keith Fernandes, a writer I otherwise admire regarding our role in the protest rally organised in support of Aires-Prajal in Panaji recently.

While frothing at the mouth, about permitting Manohar Parrikar to speak on the day (as did so many other politicians), he betrays his own pretentious belief in freedom of speech.

I deplore and condemn the viciously divisive and dangerous ideology of the Right, but to suppress anyone's right to express himself/herself as a citizen of Goa is doing exactly what the Right have done in similar circumstances when in power. We are not like that!

Also, a brutal assault on two social activists is not about brownie points being scored or political statements being managed. It is about society cutting across divides to condemn a cowardly act.

Tommorrow, it could be Jason or me at the receiving end and I hope someone, at least write a decent obit about us.

As for unmasking ourselves, we the alleged masked activists are open, frank and pretty much upfront about our positions. The only thing we will never do is to sell our soul as much as they net may convince you.

There is a medical condition called paranoid schizophrenia where everyone is suspicious of everyone else. (Must confess that even I am afflicted sometimes). But the faster we treat this the better our chances of hopefully saving Goa.

Unmasking Legality

The people’s movement needs to stress legitimacy and not legality

The two public meetings that were held, one in the T. B. Cunha Hall, and the second in the Azad Maidan, to protest the attacks on Aires Rodrigues and Prajal Sakhardande, were a scam. They were a scam, because what we saw was the hijack of the genuine frustrations and anger of the people to meet rather dubious political ends. Through these meetings a situation was created where it looked like the voices of the people were being heard, but in fact there was no real attempt to convert the voices of these angry people, into a genuine agenda for change. The event remained at the level of drama alone. A tradition, of being apolitical, that the organizers of the meeting had espoused as leaders of the GBA, was thrown to the winds. Politicians of various hues, including shockingly, Manohar Parrikar of saffron fame, came up onto the stage and used the platform to draw mileage and divert our attention from the real issues of our day.

This column will not dwell on the meetings though. It will not do so, because in the hall of mirrors that is the scene of Goan politics, this accusation of scam-ing the people can be laughed away as delusional. Instead, I would like to inaugurate with this column, a series of reflections on law and the relationship to the events that are unfolding in Goa. Reflections built on the more solid bases of definite statements and suggestions made in the public sphere.

In the course of his oration, the good Dr. Rebello suggested that as activists we should stick to only to legal courses of action. Our only courses of action should be those within the ambit of the law. Perhaps he was thinking of the actions against Aires and Prajal and speaking thus. Taking the good doctor’s advice however, would push us into a very prickly situation; and it is my recommendation that his advice be disregarded and rethought.

Dr. Oscar’s ‘legal’ suggestion, would present to us a situation where there are two options, the legal and the illegal. In a situation where the people of Goa are protesting the very operation of the law and the action of the law enforcers, pushing ourselves into this corner will kill our movement. What Dr. Oscar should have recommended is that our politics and actions be legitimate. A politics of legitimacy allows for activists actions that could be legal. However, when the law itself is perverted, a politics of legitimacy would allow for actions that may contravene the presently existing illegitimate law to create a new law that anticipates a legitimate legal framework.

If we listen to Dr. Oscar we would have to necessarily condemn the recent actions of the mining activists in Quepem who blocked the roads to the mines that are destroying their (and Goa’s) access to fresh water, creating the basis for a water crisis in Goa. People have a right to protest, but they don’t have a legal right to block roads. And yet, before protesting, these activists moved from pillar to post to draw attention to the legal irregularities around these mines; and the very real situation of destruction of livelihoods, if the mining was allowed (through a perverted understanding and manipulation) of the law. The law failed to respond. In face of this silent State complicit in human rights violations against the people, these activists took up a possibly illegal, but definitely legitimate route of protest against the mining activity.

Following the Hindu right-wing initiated and BJP supported bandh however, there are questions in the minds of a number of citizens, if we should allow for bandhs at all. ‘The forcible obstruction of my daily life is illegal’ they say, and there are voices now, calling for a ban on bandhs. The recourse to law however, by these concerned citizens is misplaced. It is misplaced, because in the nightmare that is becoming the Indian Republic, such laws that we imagine will prevent the rightist goons from obstructing our lives, will in fact be used against activists like those in Quepem, and people like us when we obstruct the illegitimate actions of the State.

In fact Manohar Parrikar, the arch sponsor of the bandh, would most definitely support our call for a ban on bandhs. He knows that when in power, it would give him greater power to suppress our voices.

The answer to our conundrum lies once more in the politics of legitimacy. Was the bandh called by the Hindu right-wing legitimate? No! The desecration of temples is obnoxious. It should not be allowed to continue. But there is a strange pattern to these desecrations here, and the BJP is clearly exulting in the continuation of these acts of vandalism. It is using these actions to create more trouble. They seem to gain more from these actions than any other group. The bandh on Monday was illegitimate, because it was used not to protest the desecrations, but to show to all of us who exactly is in power in Goa; the Hindu right wing and its goons. It was used to create a situation, where they can dictate their ridiculous agendas and make all of us toe their lines. Get in a ban on bandhs, and tomorrow these right-wing goons will still violate the law and get away with it. For example, known trouble makers in Margao were arrested a day before the bandh and let off on bail! Bail? They could have been held, as per law within the Station for another day, to ensure that they don’t create more trouble. Should the people’s movements call a bandh however, we would be shown the law that prohibits bandhs.

The protests, and future bandhs of the people’s movement in Goa are being, and will be called to draw attention of the State to the manner in which the common person in Goa is being suffocated out of existence. These are very real demands that the State, politician and the law are not addressing, and these are cries for help. The desecrations of temples are acts of cowards, who like the goons who attacked Aires, attack in the night. The acts of the politico-business class are the acts of those who know they have the backing of the law behind them, and they act in broad daylight, disemboweling our earth; raising towers that touch the sky. For those who use the law in this manner, we need to employ not only legal actions, but actions based on a politics of legitimacy. The politics of legitimacy is a politics of life, and a bandh springing from such a politics, will be fundamentally different from the bandh we saw on Monday. It would be a bandh that would not be enforced by fear and threats as was Monday’s bandh, but a bandh enforced by solidarity that people would voluntarily show.

The Goan scenario is one that is crying for change. The call for total transformation of the way the State operates is a very real demand for change. This demand, the dominant caste groups, business interests and landed interests that have infiltrated the movement are deliberately blocking. These groups seek to occupy a platform lead it away from the egalitarian paradise we wish to create, into one more cul-de-sac where they can profit from our misery. These groups use masks, of faces we trust. What we need to do is ask ourselves, what is it that these masks ask us to do?

(Published in the Gomantak Times 22nd October 2008)