Save Goa: Another front opens -- August 4

At Lohia Maidan on Sunday, another front has opened up in this fight to save Goa and Chief Minister Digambar Kamat could not have been in the dark. Farmers, a long ignored section of Goan society, finally got organised and raised their voices from close enough to Diggu for him to hear all the swearing at him and his government, from within the comforts of the balcony of his home.
The immediate provocation for the assault on the government by the ryots was the rehab of displaced kiosk-owners in prime farming land at Davorlim, ironically the pocket burrough of Churchill Alemao the former supremo of 'Save Goa Front'. But it's not Davorlim alone that hundreds of protesting farmers cried out for at Lohia Maidan. It's for the whole of Goa, and the indiscriminate acquisition of agricultural land by the government, was the first target of the new-born Goenchea Xetkarancho Ekvott.
CM Digambar Kamat has a job on his hands. For, this little fire that demonstrated its ferocity on Sunday, possesses the potential to engulf the state's political establishment, much on the same lines as the Goa Bachao Abhiyan's movement against the Regional Plan 2011 did.
Going by his past record, Diggu could soon take to spinning another one of his pro-people moves, some government decision like 'No more acquisition of agricultural land' like he said 'SEZs Scrapped', and of course the Task Force for RP 2021, both of which are yet to see the light of day!
No ‘bhendo’ for Lord Ganesha? Going by Manohar Parrikar’s definition of the ‘mother tongue’, I just discovered I have a new mother tongue - Konklish. It’s this lingo that most people I meet communicate with me and I with them as did this Goenkar bhav, who I met for the first time somewhere around Panjim's brand new market.
Last weekend, this man who I don’t know at all and suspect is in his seventies, walks up to me and asks me: ‘Sir, thum marketing korpak bazaaran pao ghatla?’
For those, not too familiar with amchi bhas, it means: ‘Sir, have you set foot in the market?’
As he spoke to me out of the blues, he sported a smile but only for that fraction of a second. The man’s face instantly changed colour and red with rage he blurted out: "The ghanvti bhendo is vhis rupyank teen. Atanch itlem, zalear Chovothek kitem?”
Translated, this means: 'The local variety of lady-finger sells at Rs 20 for three pieces. If it’s so bad now, what’s in store for Chaturthi?'
Clearly, he was shocked and not without reason. Frankly, I’ve not been to the market to check the price of lady finger, but I have no doubts this man's told me the truth. By his account, the price of a lady finger, which last year went for Rs twenty-five for a hundred, had this year jumped by an out-of-the-world 1,400 per-cent!
Yet, inflation is negative according to the Government of India, and as for our own sarkar, Digambar Kamat keeps screaming day in and day out that it stands for the aam admi.
Digguji, the aam admi can’t even afford a ‘bhendo’ this Chaturthi!

Market: Fountainhead of CCP graft
Something happened in the Panjim market last week that made it evidently clear to us that the so-called inquiry being conducted by CCP Commissioner, Sanjit Rodrigues, is going to be toothless.

There was a lot of hype and hoopla about the inauguration of some store at the new market. A 'maharaj' was imported all the way from Pinguli to solemnise the affair. After a few inquiries, it was revealed that it was a 'jewellery store' that was being inaugurated, and at the centre of it all was a lanky corporator of the CCP, known in corporator circles as the 'Market Kingpin'.
A little digging has revealed that this space was actually earmarked for a 'site office' of the CCP, where market inspectors and officials of the Corporation would operate from. This Corporator, when he was in command in the 'market committee', converted it into a shop, and allotted it to god knows who, no records are available at the CCP.
So what has this got to do with the 'inquiry' being conducted by Sanjit Rodrigues?
Well, at a time when Rodrigues' inquiry has found wholesale irregularities in shop allotments at the market and an 'interim report' listing these has been tabled in the Goa Legislative Assembly in the ongoing session, a corporator formally inaugurates his 'benami' jewellery store.
Clearly, he cares a damn for Sanjit's inquiry. Meanwhile, no one's even taking cognisance of the demand for a 'judicial probe' instead of a Commissioner-level probe, voiced by veteran Opposition Corporator, Surendra Furtado.