BENAULIM: Which means Bow was the creation of Lord Parsuram who shot an arrow from Parsuram village in Chiplun to create the beautiful white sands beaches and swaying coconut trees of sacred Benaulim. Which is now been taken over by goons and smugglers. Royla wants to liberate it!
By Our Special Correspondent
Goa is the land of Parshuram. But it has over the years been converted into the land of Narkasur by Churchill Alemao & Bros. Now young architect Royla Fernandes in Benaulim is keen to rid Goa of all Narkasur so that Goa may be re-built anew into a happy state… Royla believes in building up and not breaking up.
GOA, the land of Parshurama, has been converted into the land of the Narkasura. Legend has it that Benaulim which means a “bow and arrow” was created by Lord Parshurama. When they came to Goa there was no land available for the Saraswat Brahmins who had migrated to Bengal due to the submergence of the Saraswati river and from there to the ancient land of Gomantak.
Legend has it that Parshurama wanted to create a special paradise for his followers. So he shot his arrow from his bow from Parshurama village in Chiplun in Maharashtra. This arrow landed in the sea at Benaulim and the waters receded here to create the beautiful land of Benaulim with its white beaches and swaying palms.
UNFORTUNATELY, in more modern times Benaulim gave birth to a Churchill Alemao and his seven brothers who were hell bent on turning heaven into hell for the people! Churchill Alemao, feet tall and almost as broad, introduced muscle and money power into Benaulim and people were afraid of him like they would be afraid of a demon or a monster.
As a matter of fact Churchill is a monster I created during the language agitation. It was an agitation to make Konkani the official language of the state of Goa. Unfortunately, the Konkani movement was led by literary personalities like Pundalik Naik and Uday Mhambre. No agitation succeeds without food. No government responds to peaceful agitation. The agitation started with a cartoon by Alexyz depicting Konkani as Konkani-mai in a coffin in the oHeraldo which I edited in those years of the language agitation. This depiction aroused a lot of passion which I fuelled with editorials.
Every day for almost two years I exhorted the people of Goa, “Utt Goenkar” and “Aamchi mai bhash to aamchi raj bhash!” The Pratap Singh Raoji Rane government was in power. The majority of ministers in his Cabinet were in favour of Marathi. Rane himself was a staunch Maharashtrawadi. Rane would not listen to appeals from the best writers in Konkani. There was need for action on the ground.
And so I also created Luizinho Faleiro who recently betrayed Sonia Gandhi for four million pieces of silver and joined Mamata-didi of the Trinamool Congress which is seeking power in Goa in the next elections. Churchill in those days of long ago now, I remember, was a 4th standard pass and a regular ruffian from Benaulim. He and his brothers organised road blocks. They cut trees and then put them across the roads. They attacked government offices and damaged property. They would not allow the leaders of Marathi and ministers supporting Marathi to come to south Goa.
LANGUAGE AGITATION RALLY
It was due to their efforts at mobilising people that I can say more than two lakh people turned up for a rally at the Azad Maidan in capital city Panaji. It turned out to be the biggest rally since Liberation. The situation became worse when the police resorted to firing in Margao, leading to the death of three young protestors.
Rane would not take notice of this but Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi saw what was happening. Rajiv knew that the Congress would lose power if the aspirations of the people was not fulfilled. Many of the Marathi ministers like Harish Zantye switched sides. The writing was on the wall. Rajiv ordered Rane to hold a special assembly session to pass a bill making Konkani the official language in 1987.
But the problem was that though Konkani was the mother tongue of 98% of the population of Goa, it had no script. So the people of Goa spoke Konkani at home but their scriptures were read in Marathi. So perhaps it was innovative that Konkani in the Devnagari script became the official language of Goa.
This was not acceptable to the Catholics who did not understand Devnagari too well. For them Konkani was Konkani in the Roman script. When the bill was passed Churchill Alemao came to my office in oHeraldo. I was out celebrating the victory. But Churchill and Company wanted my staff to declare that Konkani was betrayed!
Churchill got a lot of publicity due to the language agitation. Churchill stood for elections and was elected from the Benaulim constituency on the Congress ticket. Churchill wanted to be appointed as minister for sports in the Rane cabinet which came back to power. Instead, his bitter rival Francisco Monte Cruz, who had built Fatorda stadium within six months, was appointed as sports minister of Goa.
In broad daylight his brother Alvarnas Alemao was smuggling gold from the Fatrade beach opposite Ramada Hotel. A sailing boat brought the gold biscuits in hollow lead batteries. Alvernas loaded them into the Contessa car which was the official car of the chief minister.
Unfortunately, for him a customs officer was watching him. He chased Alvernas along the narrow country road in Hindi film style and jumped from his motorbike into the open window of the front seat of the Contessa. In the scuffle which took place Alvarnaz died and Churchill bribed the CBI into filing a murder case against a custom officer.
A NEED FOR CHANGE
THE Alemaos have terrorised Benaulim for 40 long years. Just as in Santa Cruz because of Rudolf Fernandes, the youth in Benaulim too cannot get jobs. So now this land of Goa, this land of the warrior Parshuram, is beginning to be known as the land of warrior gods but of smugglers and gangsters! Goa needs a change of government. Goa needs young educated MLAs who care about Goa and its Goenkar. Which is why we are asking the people of Benaulim to select young architect Royla Fernandes as their next MLA.
Goa needs a candidate and an MLA who works for the people and not for errant taxi-drivers who treat Goa to such dadagiri. We need a MLA who does not get bribes to get a work for public good done. We need clean MLAs committed to keeping Benaulim and Goa a green state. Particularly in our times when there is a very real threat of climate change and increasing temperature. We witnessed this in Goa these heavy rains in the month of June. We have how beach erosion is taking away the land.
SO let us bring in a new dawn. Let us go back to making Benaulim a land which would make Parshurama proud again, Goa is the original land of Parshuramas and not the land of asura gangsters and terrorists who do nothing but shatter the peace of a simple people struggling to be happy again!