Opinion Goan,Goan…

But one thing is for sure: a middle class-led people’s movement of this sort could only take place in Goa. Goa,as novelist Graham Greene and countless advertising copywriters have said,is unique. But Goans never tire of complaining that the rest of India often misconstrues the state’s

special character. Extended Portuguese rule (450 years and 23 days,according to a local historian) is one reason why it’s different. But there are other factors — the most important of which has to do with pre-British,preMuslim,Brahminical India.

As photographer and cultural theorist Richard Lannoy points out,Goa’s distinctive culture has been shaped by its unique communal system of agricultural land ownership,a leftover from ancient Brahmin-dominated times. This is particularly so in the three coastal districts of Bardez,Tiswadi and Salcette: the Old Conquests area,the territory first occupied by the Portuguese in 1510. It is primarily villages in these districts that provide the setting for the popularly-imagined Goa of today — cosmopolitan,carefree,lush,exotic.

Since ancient times,the “gaonkar” or “comunidade” system has ensured that the best rice-producing land was common village property. As a result,in a quirk of history,Goa

bypassed feudalism. Village produce was shared between different castes,a system that was retained by the Portuguese colonisers. It is Goa’s unique relations of agricultural production that helped create an educated village middle class. Jesuit and Franciscan schools also helped. “Nowhere in India does one find such a substantial middle-class presence in a rural area,” Lannoy wrote in 1980,well before economic liberalisation began changing the rural landscape in the rest of India.

Greene noticed it during a visit shortly after the Portuguese left in December 1961. “There are few extremes of poverty and affluence” in a Goan village,he observed. But as he crossed the state border,though the landscape remained verdant,shanties and other signs of impoverishment appeared.

It is this well-provided and educated rural middle-class,closely connected to the international Goan diaspora,that admitted and tolerated the hippies in the ’60s. Forty years on,much has changed in Goa. Calangute is a concrete eyesore. The foreign “freaks”,who are also largely middle-class,have fled to smaller enclaves. Hordes of men from other states regularly invade the beaches to ogle or harass women in swimsuits. And crimes against tourists get more lethal.

Arambol Beach,where a nine-year-old Russian girl was raped last month,is regarded in today’s counter-culture universe as “one of the last resorts for an alternative lifestyle in Goa”. Just before the outrage,it hosted the third Indian Juggling Convention,attracting jugglers,musicians,dancers and “wellness” gurus from across the world. It is the kind of place where women can not only get an Ayurvedic massage but also attend workshops to “discover a new Lover/ Queen/ Goddess archetype.”

But both the quaint imported beach culture and the very special indigenous village ethos are under threat.

Goa is India’s smallest state by area. In its villages it is also the most exceptional. Jawaharlal Nehru,writer Maria Couto once told me,did a lot for Goa,but made one mistake — he forgot to give it protection from land sharks. Is it too late to enact laws similar to those in Himachal and Uttarakhand,where outsiders cannot purchase land?

Goa’s politicians will probably be the first to oppose such a move. It may be trite to blame politicians for all society’s ills. But in Goa you cannot escape them. “Every MLA is involved in making money illegally,and in a tiny assembly if you touch even one he or she threatens to bring down the government,” said a former officer in the Goa police.

Though Goa’s police are as venal,one cannot but agree with the officer. Someone I knew was organising a “rave party”. How does he intend to ensure that the police don’t bust it,I asked? No problem,he replied,a foolproof system: he had paid the local MLA one lakh rupees for “protection”. “The rave organiser would’ve made three times the money from selling drugs at the party,” said the officer.

Maka naka gho is the cry from the villages,the refrain from a famous Konkani folk song,“I don’t want it!”

The writer is a Delhi-based journalist