• Do we want unity in diversity or disunity in homogeneity?

By Olav Albuquerque

GOA 61st Liberation day was observed a day after the nail-biting victory of Argentina over France in FIFA; the Opinion Poll on January 16 will not be celebrated like our Liberation Day. It was the Catholic church which introduced football to Goa in 1883 through a missionary, Fr William Robert Lyons, who can rightly be called the “Father of Goan Football.” Manohar Parrikar declared football Goa’s state sport in 2012, conveniently glossing over who introduced it to Goa.
Lyons inserted football in the curriculum of St Joseph’s School at Siolim where he arrived from Udupi in 1883 to recover from illness. He later shifted the school to Arpora which has all been recorded by a British scholar, James Mills, in his tome, “Colonialism, Christians and Sports :The Catholic Church and Football in Goa, 1883-1951.” After Fr Lyons came to Goa, education was imparted in the village schools which stood adjacent to the parish church behind which was a football field. The Catholic church used football as a tool to educate Goans.
The tragedy is that we do not celebrate Opinion Poll day on January 16 with the same gusto as we do Goa Liberation Day. While we ejected the Portuguese on Liberation Day, we chose to keep our state separate on January 16 which is the only referendum held in independent India. Today, Goa has become synonymous with India because those from other states have settled in this tiny state.

RE-WRITING HISTORY
BUT to return to football, other missionaries like Fr Vincent Scuderi who was a pioneer in setting up Don Bosco High School in Panjim, took over from Fr Lyons to popularize football in Goa but their contribution has been ignored. In 1893, Antonio Francisco de Souza started football in a south Goa school at Assolna. But in re-writing Goan history, the victorious saffron brigade has turned the word “missionary” into a bad word and accused the Catholic church of proselytization.
And that football is devoid of religion became obvious when Goa’s most famous goalkeeper, Brahmanand Sankhwalkar is a legendary name in Indian football and one of the stalwarts from Goa began his career of 25 years with Panvel Sports Club before turning 16. He went on to spend 17 years with Salgaocar SC and had a three-year stint with Churchill Brothers.
But Catholicism does seem to have played a role in football. Argentina and Portugal are staunchly Catholic countries with Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo being baptized Catholics. Kylian Mbappe from France is a practicing Christian – but football knows no caste or religion. When you entered the football ground, nobody asked your caste. What mattered were your dribbling skills.
Goa voted to remain separate from Maharashtra in 1967 so that football, fish and feni would not be replaced by kabbadi, vada pau and desi daru. We have to thank the late Dr Jack Sequeira and his now defunct United Goans Party for keeping Goa and our football separate – our higher GDP and literacy rate attracts migrants who form a vote bank for our corrupt politicians.
History is a story of the victors which is why the saffron brigade is re-writing Goan history. What few know is the Bharatiya Janata Party in its earlier avatar of the Jana Sangh strongly backed Goa’s merger with Maharashtra. Deen Dayal Upadhyay wrote in the “Organizer” on July 25, 1965 that Goa should have been merged with Maharashtra without holding an Opinion Poll simply because the MGP was voted to power in the very first election.
It was Dr Jack Sequeira who convinced Lal Bahadur Shastri and Indira Gandhi of the need for an Opinion Poll to decide Goa’s future in 1967. But Dayanand Bandodkar has a statue within the legislative complex at Porvorim while Dr Jack Sequeira, like the Father of Goan Football, Fr William Robert Lyons, are both ignored for their contributions. It is said the mine owners propped up Dayanand Bandodkar as Goa’s first chief minister to protect their interests because as upper caste Hindus, they wanted Goa to merge with Maharashtra.

UNBIASED OFFICIAL HISTORY
WITHOUT doubt, these same mine owners built the first colleges in Goa and launched the first newspapers and also the first coastal steamer service from Panjim to Bombay as it was then known. Ironically, football and the Catholic church are intertwined. Simply because the grounds behind the churches were used to play football which is analogous to the temples which provide amenities to the poor.
This is why we need an unbiased official history of Goa to preserve our unique heritage of the Konkani language, football + the Catholic church and our ancient temples, which all contributed to modern Goa.
Unless we celebrate Opinion Poll day and honor Fr William Lyons with as much gusto as we do Goa Liberation Day, we will lose our identity with the concept of one nation, one religion, one language being forced upon us.
There is unity in diversity but disunity in homogeneity.