THE CHARITABLE trust Vidya Vikas Mandal is at it again. Making the parents of their unaided school, Vidya Vikas Academy, shell out thousands of rupees to watch a musical show, ‘One Enchanted Evening’, put up by the students of pre-primary up to fourth standard.

The plans for the show, which the management along with the principal had kept a well guarded secret, were thrown open in the school office. And, as expected, the tickets are very steep, Rs.1000, Rs.750, Rs.500 and Rs.300.

The seating arrangement at Ravindra Bhavan in Margao are thus: first two rows at Ravindra Bhavan are reserved for the management (free of cost). The next five rows are for parents and their guests at Rs.1000 per head, next six rows at Rs.750 per head, after that another six rows at Rs.500 per head and the remaining Rs.300 per head.

For the school management running the charitable trust or mandal along with the principal, this is just another mode to make gullible parents pay. Mind you, this money is not credited in the school accounts but in the Mandal’s account.

Why should parents of the VVA pay the Mandal when we have already been made to pay huge amount as donations to the Mandal at the time of admission of our wards? Again they are trying to fleece the parents with such musical shows. Worse still is the fact that parents have already been made to pay Rs.100 for the event brochure, the cost of the costumes for the musical show have been borne by the parents (in some cases, the cost has ranged between Rs.400 and Rs. 1500). Hence, why should parents be made to buy tickets for the musical evening when they have paid for everything that their child requires to be a part of the musical show?

For the members of Vidya Vikas Mandal, money is everything. They are not bothered about the quality of education or the hardships of the parents as long as they reach their target of profits annually.

Alex Coelho,
Velsao.

THACKERAYS’ MUMBAI

OUR Prime Minister Manmohan Singhji vows to make Mumbai another Shanghai. This is acceptable to all non-Maharashtrians. Maharashtrians Bal and Raj Thackeray (not Thakre?) find it difficult to digest. For them, the mere thought of Mumbai becoming Shanghai is like Mumbai not belonging to Maharashtra. They react violently and divert their ire towards poor Bihari taxiwalas.

We, who all along have been calling Goa “amchem Goem” from time immemorial, now already have people in the thousands from other states. The economics imposed upon us and accepted by us is such that we need outside manual labour. So Goa needs them and they need Goa. Today, Goa and Goans are two different entities.

Thus Goa, it seems, has preferred the Mumbai model. Now Mumbai will be Shanghai and Goa will become Mumbai. In Shanghai, Marathi will never be accepted as her sole language. In Goa, transformed into Mumbai, Konkani will not be acceptable as the state’s sole language. A few Goans themselves take pride in stating that Goa is a cosmopolitan state.

I always claim that my ‘Indianness’ is inclusive, different from that one preached by the Thackerays. My ‘Indianness’ is the source of moulding a desirable, prosperous and tolerant Goa. Will we who think likewise, and there are many of us, ever get an opportunity to work for that Goa? Where is that “Bangor Boil” gone? Bull with horns that by his mere presence gets what he wants?

There are some who say that it is impossible now to stop this process. They add, wisdom demands that we resign ourselves to what is to come. If this is so, then why the hell was Goa conferred the status of a state?
Somewhere around 1963, I had seen a cartoon in a daily wherein a child was holding the hand of an elder and walking on the street. The child was Goa and the elder was Pandit Nehru. “Safe and secure!” was the title of the cartoon, if I am not wrong. Today I feel Goans are frightened of Mother India. This may be the consequence of our being weak citizens and therefore helpless ones. “Mhaka saiba vatt kollona!” has become Goa’s national song.

Kakasaheb Kalelkar always said Goans were a “manly” people (Purusharthi). “The language of a vital people can never be a dialect. That is why Konkani is a language,” was his argument. He expected Goa to become a model to other states in India, to emulate. (Model? My God, today the whole of India calls Goa a model rape state!)

“I belong to that race which composed Mahabharata and invented chess!” said that greatest Goan who only had a forty-year life and who died two days before Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born. Do we consider ourselves heirs to that great sage F L Gomes?

My question is: Shall we come out of the syndrome “mhaka saiba vat kollona!”? It’s now or never!

Gurunath Kelekar,
Margao.

PILS

THE concept of Public Interest Litigations (PILs) has over the last two decades, grown and expanded to cover all types of litigation involving the interests of the general public.

The Supreme Court has recently directed each High Court to frame its own rules on Public Interest Litigations. Would it not have been better for the Supreme Court itself to formulate the rules so that the same could be uniformly enforced by every High Court across the country? This would ensure some consistency in the manner in which our judges address PILs.

It would be nice to see our courts being more proactive and taking suo motu cognisance of public views. This would, in a way, help to ensure a PIL does not end up as a Private Interest Litigation, Political Interest Litigation, Publicity Interest Litigation or worse still, a Paisa Interest Litigation.

Aires Rodrigues,
Ribandar.