Caption: Harmony: Caught in a sweltering heatwave Goans are debating whether St Francis Xavier should be referred to as Goencho Saib or Bhagavan Parshuram should be referred to as the patron saint of Goa!

Intro: If there is one thing that unites all in Goa, it is the misinformation about the Inquisition. The result of this misinformation, as professional historians have pointed out for some years now, can lead to communal clashes between Hindus and Catholics. Recently we have seen former RSS boss Subhash Velingkar call for the denouncement of St Francis Xavier as Goencho Saib.

By Joshua George

S

Subhash Velingkar’s comments that St Francis Xavier should be denounced of the unofficial title of Goencho Saib has caused a stir among the Catholics and the Hindu majority in the state of Goa. For years now the people of Goa have lived in communal harmony with mutual respect for every religion and its practices. Since the Valentines’s day election of 5 states, the BJP’s influence across the country has increased manifold. The country has been riddled with atrocities against minorities. For as long as I can remember Goa has been shielded from the communal wars between Hindus, Muslims, Christians etc. Perhaps the horrors of our colonial past has made us united as one community. Is this what the so-called Double Engine government promised?

While Subhash Velingkar refuses to apologise and says his comments are not to cause communal disharmony but merely highlight the atrocities of the Goa Inquisition, the inclusion of St Francis Xavier does raise questions of his true motives. Catholics are misinformed because any attempt to confront this most shameful chapter of history is met with right-wing abuse and the ire of secular liberal ideologues. Hindus are also misinformed because this right-wing propaganda is the main vehicle through which they receive information about the Inquisition. So, what is the truth? And how do we confront this? This is where Fr Victor Ferrao a Philosophy scholar and lecturer at the Rachol Seminary says we should approach this subject “dialogically and not polemically”.

“One cannot linearize History but look at it with a larger lense horizontally”. “The unofficial title of Goencho Saib has come over centuries”. “It is a living tradition that people refer to St Francis Xavier as Goencho Saib”. So why at this abrupt point more than 500 years later is Subhash Velingkar trying to usurp this symbolic space that has encompassed people of different faiths? Are the right-wing Hindutva brigade so insecure and scared that the Chief Minister Pramod Sawant had to publicly announce that Hindus should protect their Gods?

The Goa Inquisition has been studied, but most studies concentrate upon the victims of Jewish descent. They were the main targets of the tribunals of Inquisition everywhere. However, the number of native victims, though less harshly treated, was proportionally larger says Moira born historian Teotonio D’Souza who has published several books and is currently based in Lisbon-Portugal

The Inquisition was established in Goa in 1560 at the behest of St Francis Xavier. He was well aware of the brutality of the Inquisition tribunal says Subhash Velingkar. But according to Teotonio D’Souza, “Francis Xavier and Simao Rodidrigues the founding members of the society of Jesus were together in Lisbon”. “This was incidentally before Francis Xavier left for India. Both were asked to spiritually assist the prisoners of the Inquisition and were present at the very first auto-da-fé (the ritual of public penance carried out between the 15th and 19th centuries of condemned heretics and apostates imposed by the Spanish, Portuguese, or Mexican Inquisition) celebrated in Portugal in September 1540”.  Twenty three were absolved and two were condemned to be burnt which included a French cleric. Hence Francis Xavier could not have been aware of the brutality of the inquisition” he says.

On Tuesday 3rd May when Subhash Velingkar scheduled the release of the Goa Files at Gomantak Maratha Samaj hall Panaji he claimed the inquisition was requested by Jesuit missionary Francis Xavier. However, no real evidence exists and nor has he provided any proof. There only is the famous letter from Malacca (Malaysia) dated 16 May 1546 to King John III of Portugal which asked for a king’s minister with powers to protect new converts from ill-treatment by Portuguese commandants and a similar one was found dated 20 January 1545, over 3 years after he had already left Goa.

Between the beginning of the inquisition in 1561 and its temporary abolition in 1774, around 16,000 persons were charged before the Inquisition. This is showcased by the fact that the inquisition had been declared nearly 2 decades after he had left Goa. The main laws of the Inquisituon were implemented in 1567 about 25 years after his leaving. In fact, around 15 years had passed since his death and the transfer of relics back to Old Goa. The most conclusive evidence actually comes from the fact that there exist archives of all his letters to Europe, and none of which call for the persecution of infidels says Fr Victor Ferrao.

The hypocrisy of the Goa Files also stares us in the eyes as it conveniently hides certain facts of history explains Fr Victor. “If St Francis Xavier is to be blamed and they want to go down the polemical route shouldn’t Timoja (Timaya) of Honavar the then Admiral of the Honavar fleet also be blamed for inviting Alfonso Albuquerque to Goa. Afonso de Albuquerque had no royal instructions to conquer Goa. He just had an explicit programme or orders to conquer Malacca, Hormuz and Eden.

The Hindu chiefs of Goa had written to Timoja an exiled Hindu from Goa about how they were being exploited by the Muslim subjects of the Adil Shah regime. They pledged to support Timoja in the event he agreed to help them to change this situation. Timoja, informed by the oppressed Goan Hindus of the favourable conditions to oust the Muslims from the city of Goa, persuaded Albuquerque and his captains to conquer it. Thus the Hindus of Goa together with Timoja’s party helped Albuquerque to conquer the state.” And thus, began the 500-year conquest that gets conveniently blamed on the Catholics.

Fr Victor stresses that it is not his intention to go down the road of pinning the blame but rather it is time to let bygones be bygones and let our rich heritage unite us as one like it has always been. “If they want to be polemical then we could also read between the lines and bring the people responsible to justice,” he says. But as mentioned in the headline it is time for dialogue to heal the wounds of our colonial past without targeting and sanctioning an entire community to the guillotine.