The Goa government belatedly woke up to the “highly objectionable” and “obnoxious” ad posted by the House of Abhinandan Lodha that advertised the rulers of Delhi, now conquering Goa. By the time the state government wrote to the company, the advertisement was already withdrawn, meaning the state government’s action has come a little too late and as such has served only as a symbolic gesture.
The company has since apologised and withdrawn the ad, which it said was published earlier this year by a partner agency and was withdrawn with effect from July 31 this year. What this means is that only after the matter was raised in the Goa Legislative Assembly by members of the ruling as well as the opposition, that the company realised the offensive nature of its ad and decided to withdraw it on its own accord. It remains a question of what took the state government so long to see exactly how offensive the ad was to Goan sensibilities and then act against it.
Nonetheless, what the state government hasn’t addressed is how much of the current pace of ‘capture’ of Goan lands and properties by those from outside feels like a conquest of Goa when seen from the viewpoint of the local population. In fact, the current refrain among local Goans is that “no coloniser has destroyed Goa as much as those from Delhi” as was heard at a recent protest against noise pollution at Anjuna in Goa.
For a government that takes much pride in telling us how it is keeping the interests of poor Goans first, it is quite telling how little attention is paid to the big, alarming changes that are happening around with the government remaining a mute spectator.
On that front, seeking an apology from a builder and allowing him to get away with withdrawing the ad with no further consequences appears to be a cop-out by the state government. At a time when individuals have been prosecuted for saying far less offensive and objectionable statements, the state government’s decision to leave it at that and prosecute no further leaves much to be desired.
The least that the state government should have demanded is an advertisement of a similar dimension and of a similar duration to be broadcast across the channels where it was initially advertised expressing regret for its decision to run the ad with such an offensive tagline. In the absence of a similar-sized apology, the state government should have launched prosecution against the company for its ad.
Secondly, more than the ad, what the state government needs to do is tackle the offensive projects themselves. It is clear by now that village after village in Goa is opposed to mega projects. Such sentiments of the people need to be respected simply because it is the right thing to do in the interest of Goa. Instead what the government is proposing is to take away the powers of the village panchayats to decide whether projects should be allowed or not and make a panchayat approval a mere formality dealing a huge blow to grassroots democracy.
A real commitment to the cause of Goan sentiments will be when the government learns to respect local sentiment instead of dancing to the tunes of the high and mighty.
