August 27, 2006
{{editorial}}
Of Forked Tongues and the Mother Tongue: Language in Goan Politics
Goa is once again seeing a controversy relating to language, in this small state along the west coast of India. Frederick Noronha takes a look back in time to explain the background of language politics in the region.
Language controversies have played an important role in
shaping Goa's reality, particularly in the 'eighties and the
'nineties. Two prominent mass-based language protests
eclipsed most other public issues during this period. One was
the 1985-87 Konkani versus Marathi 'official language'
controversy; the other, the discord which raged over regional
languages versus English as a medium of instruction in 1990-91.
Historians looking back at the Goa of the 'eighties and the
'nineties will perhaps find paradoxical the publicly recorded
attitude of the average Goan towards the language issue. A
volatile subject by any standards, there is however a void of
vital significance in that record. 
Undeniably, there have been sincere supporters of this or the
other language in Goa. But leaving aside those and their
motivations, it is inexplicably why the behind-the-scenes
scripts of the language controversies in the State are seldom
discussed and analysed, even in academic circles which should
be willing to take up such critical contemporary issues.
Given half-a-dozen years since the 'language controversy'
ended, it is perhaps time to look more closely at the
underpinnings. What is perhaps needed is to look beyond
supporting one side or the other, and instead take a more
dispassionate look at the issues behind the 'issues'. This
paper attempts to draw attention to some facts which hint at
the politics behind the language stirs.
When it came to language loyalties in Goa, ironies abounded
on all sides. Marathi backers (calling themselves
dual-language backers) pointed out that large sections of the
'Konkani camp' used English as the preferred means of
communication, both spoken and written. If this charge was
not untrue, so was the counter-charge: most Marathi
supporters in Goa actually spoke Konkani.
But that is not the end of the story. During the 1990-91
medium of instruction protests, those demanding the right to
study in government-subsidised English medium primary schools
marched down the main thoroughfares of Panjim and on to the
Bishop's Palace, carrying placards and shouting slogans in
Konkani. Top politicians who have campaigned for regional
languages in a vociferous manner have been publicly accused
of sending their own children to premier English-medium
schools, even to distinct places outside Goa.
As Jyotsna Kamal points out [Economic & Political Weekly, Vol
XXI, No 14, April 5, 1986, p 569]: "The language controversy
in Goa has a long history and reflects several paradoxes and
aberrations. Why, for instance, did the Portuguese encourage
for the initial 150 years, but throttle it later? Why did the
Portuguese tolerate the 'mustifund' schools started privately
by collecting fistfuls of grain from each household? The
Portuguese even sponsored Marathi schools in the 19th
century. How come the historic verdict of the Opinion Poll
not to merge with Maharashtra was followed immediately by the
Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) ruling over Goa (for
nearly a decade and half)?"
As the Madras-based journal The Hindu (December 28, 1986)
wrote: "Another peculiar feature is that though 90 percent of
the people of the territory speak Konkani, more than 60
percent of the Hindus have enrolled their children in Marathi
medium schools. Konkani protagonists have no compunctions
about sending their children to English-medium schools. There
are no takers for Konkani-medium schools."
Despite the controversy and the conflict, the row over what
is Goa's official language is one which still smoulders...
ministers holding the portfolio have been ambivalent; and
this reflects in their uncertainty over whether to designate
themselves the Minister for Official Language or Languages. 
At the end of the day, politicians are still fighting over
what exactly is Goa's official language (or, alternatively,
languages). Scenes over this could be witnessed in the Goa
Assembly even months ago.
Recently, some evidence tumbled out to show the important
role played by MGP leaders in drafting the Official Language
Act of 1987, in the version it was finally passed. But this
law -- intending to please all, but in reality satisfying
none -- is more ambiguous than clear about what the position
is. The law actually passed on February 4, 1987, was very
much different from the pro-Konkani law sought to be pushed
through months earlier, as the Goa, Daman and Diu Official
Languages Bill, 1986. 
The law, as passed, says that the Konkani language (in the
Devanagari script) shall be the official language for "any or
all" of the official purposes of the Union Territory (as it
then was), and that "different dates may be appointed for
different official purposes". But this shall take effect only
such date as the (then Union territory) Administrator, by
notification, appoint...." Though Konkani is called the
"official language", Marathi "shall also be used for all or
any of the official purposes" following similar notifications
by Administrator.
By its non-committal stance, this is a law under which it is
virtually impossible to implement either Konkani or Marathi,
or both, as the official language(s) of Goa. Given the ground
reality, it is unlikely that either one of the two contending
camps would be keen to press for official language status in
a manner in which the "other" language would be given the
same. Precisely because language is seen as a zero-sum game:
where one party has to lose for the other to gain.
Former editor of the Marathi daily 'Gomantak' N G Athavale, a
key figure in defining part of the agenda for the 1985-87
language war said rather cryptically, recently, when speaking
from the Shiv Sena platform in mid-October at Mapusa:
"Marathi lost the battle but Konkani did not win either. It
was the [Congress(I) party] observers from Karnataka who won."
HIDDEN ISSUES IN THE LANGUAGE WAR
But then, what were some of the less obvious issues in the
language agitation, which can be termed the first all-Goa
protests since the Opinion Poll days of the 'sixties,
involving people across the State.
Row Kavi gives a good idea [See Row Kavi Ashok, 'Settling Old
Scores', 'Orphaned Language' and 'Yearning Of People' in The
Week, Cochin, January 18-24, 1987, p 11] of the caste and
communal conflict stoking the bitterness over language, as
well as some of the other political and other interests in
his journalistic essay.
He sees the language battle as a mildly-camouflaged caste
war, with "the Goa Congress supported mainly by the Catholics
and Konkani Porjecho Awaz (KPA), claiming to represent all
Konkani interests including the Gowda Saraswats as well as
Christians ... (having) decided to harass the
Maratha-dominated Congress(I)."
Row Kavi (ibid, 15) describes the situation thus: "Some local
Christians converted by the Portuguese did not like Cunha
Rivara's idea (of using the regional languages for
education). They chose to educate their children in
Portuguese. The Hindus, who had by then retreated to the
hinterland, brought in Karada, Deshasth and Konkanasth
Brahmins from Maharashtra to teach their children in
Marathi... Only two institutions kept the fact in mind that
Konkani was indeed a living language. One was the Catholic
Church which knew that the Gospel could be spread only
through the local language. The other was the Gowda Saraswat
Brahmin community which considered it the 'divyabhasha'
(divine language). They controlled the temples in the
hinterland and hired Maratha Brahmins to manage them while
they adjusted to the situation by learning enough Portuguese
and becoming bureaucrats, all the while talking Konkani at
home.
"So quick was their rise that they invited the wrath of both
the Church and the Maratha brahmins. Some of the Maratha
Brahmins even took the Gowda Saraswat Brahmins to the Madras
High Court, accusing them of unbrahmanical practices --
eating fish and of hobnobbing with the 'mlecha'. The
Maharashtrian Brahmins lost the case. The animosity between
the two Brahmin sects grew. The Gowda Saraswats continued to
prosper. The Marathas intended to keep the temple rituals in
Marathi and the Gowda Saraswats minded their money in Konkani
written in the Devanagari script. Saraswats... used the
Catholics against the usurpers from Maharashtra... and they
would continue to hold the strings of the economy."
One other report noted with bluntness: "It would appear even
after 25 years of self-government, there is a latent fear in
the Hindu bahujan samaj (non-Saraswat Brahmin castes) that
they may be dominated by the Christian-Hindu Brahmin
combination which had ruled the roost in the last 15 years of
erstwhile Portuguese colonial rule."
John Ribeiro, writing in the Sunday Observer (January 1,
1987) argues that the Konkani used by the literati is, in
essence, different from colloquial Konkani because the
Konkani litterati came typically from the Saraswat Brahmin
caste. He quotes another Gomantak ex-editor B D Satoskar as
saying, "What is being written today is Saraswat Konkani. The
move to standardise it will create a reaction from the Hindu
Bahujan Samaj, or the non-Saraswats... (like the revolt
against Marathi in Maharashtra). A large number of the
Bahujan Samaj are hostile to Konkani and favour the dual
language formula because of the hostility to Saraswat Konkani."
Was this really the case? What other explanation can there be
for the involvement of Catholics, virtually en masse, on the
Konkani side of the 1985-87 language agitation?
The more obvious factor was the role of the Catholic Church
in taking a pro-Konkani stand. Apart from this, there is the
less-noticed reality of the 'alienation factor', if one could
call it that. Konkani was used as a tool by a section of the
Catholic middle-class to combat the feeling of alienation
brought on among a fast-Westernising section of the society.
In the post-colonial situation, when the demands of
identity-formation have rapidly changed, quite a few among
this section seem eager to at least have a language link to
'genuine' Indianness, their claim to which is otherwise
questioned. Besides, the campaigning of Hindutva communal
groupings seem to have also aggravated such sentiments, with
the Catholic sometimes finding himself questioned for his
religious affiliation, level of Westernisation and even
patriotism.
Whether one accepts this view or not, it would be difficult
to argue against or refute the contention that some form or
the other of casteism, communalism and chauvinism played a
key role in the language protests. Of course, there were
exceptions to this trend.
Caste-based divides were a little more difficult to perceive,
camouflaged as they were under a thick sheath of other
elements. But communalism, as always, is a rather blatant
phenomenon. The Sunday Observer, then a lively and well-read
journal, focussed on it in a three-word, inch-tall -- even if
simplistic -- headline, "Goans Turn Communal" (The Sunday
Observer, December 28, 1986). But there was perhaps good
reason to substantiate this belief.
One of the Konkani agitation leaders came out with a volume
of translations of editorials published in a prominent local
journal, in an attempt to show that such campaigning through
the media exacerbated the communal divide. [Naik, Datta,
'Laying The Grounds For Communal Riots', published by the
author, 1987.] But the editor facing the charge, Narayan
Athavale of the Gomantak argued that Naik had undertaken an
"outright perverted translation... aimed at defaming me as
well as all the Marathi-speaking Goans". 
Athavale, then incidentally also a member of the Press
Council of India, contended that the translations of his
editorial had taken "advantage of a sentence without proper
reference and (placing it in) the context not in which it was
used, to present a distorted meaning."
Students belonging to the then-active Progressive Students
Union still recall frenetic efforts to stall the communal
demon which suddenly arose in areas like Benaulim, Mapusa and
Vasco. Communalisation of the protests was also visible from
the pattern of deaths following group clashes in Dongrim.
(This incident was not directly related to the language
agitation, but it could take place due to the consequent
breakdown of law and order in the State. Besides, the hatred
with which these killings were committed also points to the
bitter communal polarisation which preceded this incident.)
One of the few citizens' rights groups then active in Goa
also reported incidents from Shiroda, Vasco and Marcela and
in "other areas of Goa" stating however that these were
"relatively minor" in nature. [See, 'Language Agitation In
Goa: Police Firing at Gogol, Margao, CCLDR Report, Citizens
for Civil Liberties and Democratic Rights, Goa, March 1987.]
Shadowy groups like one calling itself 'Konkniche Suicide
Squad' also sprouted, to issue anonymous threats to a number
of clubs organising Christmas dances -- in Taleigao,
Betalbatim, Cansa-Tivim, Parra, Mapusa and Panjim.
[Handwritten note titled 'Warning', signed by the 'Konkniche
Suicide Squad', undated.]
Another report by the CCLDR ['Language Stir in Goa -- A
Report', unpublished] also notes the questionable response of
the State. It found "a disturbing fact that there appeared to
be a tendency to make selective arrests from the minority
Christian community".
Pamphlets too were silently doing the rounds at this time,
only adding to the already critical communal polarisation.
One example of this is the printed pamphlet titled 'KPA-cho
Ullo No 1' [KPA's First Call; undated, publisher not
mentioned]. Incidentally, the KPA here stands not for the
Konkani Porjecho Avaz, as the wider-used acronym of the
period more commonly known, but for the 'Kristi Porjecho
Avaz', and issues raised included allegations of denial of
government jobs to Christians, the attitude to laugh away the
Konkani speech used by the community, and the lack of
benefits received despite wholehearted participation in the
Opinion Poll 1967. 
Another anonymous, photocopied two-page letter, signed by the
'Catholic Youth Forces -- Miramar, Panjim, Santa Cruz and
Merces' wrote to entertainment organisers and demanded that
they "transfer" their advertisements from one newspaper to
another, on communal considerations.
Chauvinism, particularly of the regional kind, was also
perceptible to someone following the course of the protests.
For the Konkani side, the main argument around which support
by the language was built up was, often, the claim that
absence of Konkani as the sole official language would lead
to Goa being swamped by "outsiders". The promise also put out
was that "locals" would get job preferences if Konkani was
made the sole official language, a promise which did not
materialise.
"Goa has to face continuous onslaughts on its identity for
the last twenty-five years," said a KPA memorandum, "and the
onslaughts are being continued even today, with the result
that a complete change in Goa is (being) brought about and
Goans are becoming aliens in their own homeland." [See, KPA
English translation of the original Konkani memorandum
submitted to the chief minister on December 10, 1976,
unpublished mss.] The umbrella organisations heading the
Konkani side of the language protest also argued at the
height of the agitation that the ethnic population of Goa had
diminished because of the government's failure to encourage
and promote Konkani. [See Munshi, Debashish, 'Pro-Konkani
rally turns violent', report in The Times of India, December
19, 1986.]
Pillai (The Sunday Observer, December 28, 1986) also notes
the "obvious" chauvinism in the Marathi camp. He says the
Gomantak editor Narayan Athavale took a "holier-than-thou"
attitude, and quotes Athavale saying: "Konkani has little
literature of its own. In all, there are 300 books published
in Konkani, whereas Marathi has a rich literary history. It
(Konkani) is spoken by everyone, but the written language is
Marathi. That is why I have been telling these people, go
develop your language for about 20 years and then agitate."
One other publicly-circulated pamphlet, strongly urging a
boycott of festival celebrations and appealing for a 'Black
Christmas' in the winter of 1986, puts it thus: "If your
(elected) leaders ... attempt to sell you in slavery, for the
greed of paltry copper coins, in the hands of pot-bellied,
pan-potti spit cultured, poverty ridden, stink smeared,
corruption imbued Maha-brutes (sic), would there still be a
place for celebrations?" [An appeal for (a) Black Christmas,
Anonymous, December 1986, unpublished mss.]
THE MEDIUM OF INSTRUCTION ISSUE
Some three years after the "end" of the official language
agitation, another language-related controversy began to take
over the domain of public discussion. This was relating to
the medium of instruction at the primary level. Leaving aside
finer details involved, what needs to be noted here is that
the controversy basically revolved around whether English
should be allowed to have a role at the primary level of
education or not.
Oddly, this controversy began when someone noticed a petition
in the courts, brought forward by primary school teachers of
minority-run schools who were seeking an improvement of their
poor pay conditions, equal to those of the government school
teachers in the State. 
Teachers in non-government primaries were putting in some
amount of work, and were being paid basic salaries of just
between Rs 165 and Rs 400 per month, as against the
government teachers' corresponding scale of Rs 1,200. But
there was a catch here: private primary schools in Goa were
not being given government grants for some strange reason.
And, in its School Education Act, the Goa government had laid
down that nothing in Chapter IV (dealing with the terms and
conditions of service of employees of recognised private
schools) would apply to "an unaided minority school".
Church-affiliated schools, and those run by the Jesuits and
two other religious societies of nuns -- which were also
affected by the ruling -- argued in court and sought refuge
under the cultural and education rights of minorities
contained in Article 29 and 30 of the Constitution. 
Actually, the issue was simply economic: if the government
was not giving any grants to private schools, it could hardly
expect that the schools pay staff at governmental scales. But
instead of the emphasis being laid on the fact that the
schools were "unaided", it was on their "minority" character.
This resulted in the Goa High Court Bench ruling that
allowing the private primary schools to pay lower salaries to
their staff (merely because they were minority institutions)
would be ultra-vires of Article 14 of the Constitution. [Writ
Petition No 302 of 1988, judgement dated November 7/8, 1989.]
Three months after this judgement, the tenth session of the
All India Konkani Writers' Conference put forward a demand
that the Goa government "should impart pre-primary and
primary education in Konkani only ... (and) that no grants
nor assistance should be given to those private schools which
harm the minds of the tender children by thrusting on them...
pre-primary and primary education in alien languages,
especially English". ['Resolutions Passed', Konkani Basha
Mandal, no date.] Later, in another development, backers of
both Marathi and Konkani joined forces to demand government
grants for private primary schools, provided they did not use
English as the medium of instruction. The MGP-dominated
Progressive Democratic Front government acceded to this
demand.
Goa's Catholic Church, the schools of which were most
affected by this issue, took a zig-zagged position.
Ironically, it showed resistance and a determination to
challenge the policy, and seek grants for its many
English-medium primary schools. [See 'A Tricky Problem',
Renewal, Pastoral Bulletin of the Archdiocese of Goa, March
15, 1990.] 
It should be noted that by this time, government grants had
become essential, as the teachers had to be paid at
government scales, as laid down by the court judgement.
Later, the Church changed its stance and readied to implement
a policy of switching over the primary schools to the
regional language, i.e. Konkani. With the change, the Church
was itself pitted against pro-English-medium parents, some of
whom took out vociferous protest marches.
Incidentally, politicians -- particularly those of the
Congress(I), when they were out of power in 1990 -- took a
strong interest in backing protests over this issue. But when
the same party got back into power, the issue was, apparently
cynically, forgotten. In this case, the laudable aim of
teaching children in regional languages was turned into
another contentious issue, obviously because of the deep
divide which exists among various sections of Goan society. 
A salary dispute was conveniently used to enforce Konkani and
Marathi primary education, despite the fact that nearly forty
percent of the primary students were, at the time, studying
in the English medium. No efforts were made to see why
parents -- including some from the most deprived sections of
society -- were so keen to have their children educated
through English. Neither was any effort made at least to
acknowledge -- if not to tackle -- the divisions within Goan
society.
WHO DISTORTS THE ISSUE?
Who do even genuine issues in Goa have to get twisted and
distorted, in a way that is hardly helpful to all but a tiny
handful? The discerning writer on Goa (and anthropologist)
Robert S Newman gives this understanding of the situation,
through in a different context:
"First the society is divided by caste and class, with two
major religious groups and one minor one (Muslim). Second,
there is a long history of oppression, including the
Inquisition, and discrimination by Catholics (both Portuguese
and Goan) against the others. Third, upper class landlords
and government officials during colonial times and landlords,
industrialists and businessmen in recent times have exploited
the lower or working classes -- tenants, miners, dock
workers, toddy-tappers, servants, factory hands, waiters and
drivers, for example ... some of the so-called freedom
struggles of the past were really attempts by (the) powerful
landlord class to exploit their erstwhile 'subjects' without
Portuguese interference."
Not incidentally, it was sections from these very groups who
have played a determining role in language-related
controversies, and some others too, in Goa. Therefore, that
they went the way they did is not much of a surprise.
"Whatever the outcome of the language controversy," Jyotsna
Kamal writes perceptively in 1986, one could say with the
benefit of hindsight, "the voice of the people no doubt will
remain hushed." [Economic & Political Weekly, Vol XXI, No 14,
April 6, 1986, p 569.]
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