Paradise not lost, yet

I had expected Diago Francis Rodrigues to be a tall, muscular man in all whites, and with a booming voice. The elected panchayat member, president of the tenants’ association, and leader of an agitation against a mega-resort turned out, instead, to be a beaming 70-year-old who went by just Francis. A thin, short man, his hands moved in animation as he told his story in a sing-song tone, as if in a production of tiatr, Goa’s popular musical theatre.

We were in Tiracol, or Terekhol, perhaps the remotest settlement of Goa. At the northernmost end of the state’s famed coastline, Tiracol is a 300-acre enclave within Maharashtra, cut off from the Goan mainland by the Terekhol River where it meets the Arabian Sea.

To this day, the only connection to Tiracol from Goa is across the river mouth by ferry. Only the occasional tourist who ventures this far knows the secret of this ferry ride, a breathtaking view even by Goa’s standards. As the ferry chugs over the azure waters, casuarina trees lazily sway in the breeze at the jetty. On the other end, the Tiracol cliff rises against the sea, its land hidden by dense foliage. Only the St Anthony’s Church atop the Tiracol Fort is visible, its white façade solemnly surveying the majestic view.

But when the ferry docks at Tiracol jetty, the daydream is broken. In front is a stern message, crudely painted in black on a metal signboard: “The Tirakolkars are all united to oppose the golf course proposed by Leading Hotels Ltd in Tiracol.”

Acres of dispute: The erstwhile landlords sold 12 lakh square metres, parcel by parcel, to a Delhi-based firm, Leading Hotels Ltd.

Overlooked for decades by the thousands, and then millions who thronged Goa’s more popular beaches due south, Tiracol was, one fine day, faced with a sudden extinction by tourism. In 2006, it was decided behind closed doors that the entire village would be razed and turned into an international-standard golf course and luxury resort. The land sale, covering 90 per cent of the total land, included nearly all homes, fields and cashew plantations. Its story is the stuff of legends, of modern grandiose projects coming face to face with Goa’s dark past of tenant exploitation, a welfare state trapped in its own contradictions.

In a way, this is a story of Goa. Francis, as I was to find out, would be this tale’s unlikely protagonist. Days after his death, it is a story that has to be retold.

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Francis was born in 1947 to a family of cashew cultivators. His ancestors had moved there some 200 years ago, and earned a living from the nuts as well as by distilling the liquor, feni.

After every summer harvest, his ancestors balanced earthen pots full of feni on their heads, and made a week-long journey on foot to the Mapusa market.

What is today an hour-long drive was then an arduous journey over two rivers by boat and a trek over the hills of Bardez.

Until the end of Portuguese rule in 1961, this life was underscored by a feudal system patronised by the colonial state. Landlords, typically from upper castes, commanded huge swathes of land by executive decree. Cultivators were held as tenants on largely unwritten terms, and they paid exorbitant rents with no rights or protection from eviction. For a small settlement such as Tiracol there was one landlord, the Khalap family.

“They used to call us with a clap of hands, no name,” Francis recollected during one of our several meetings, on a tour of the cashew plantation. Nobody in the village dared to challenge the landlord, fearing immediate eviction. “In other words, we were like slaves.”

Stand still: A video grab of Diago Francis Rodrigues, the face of Tiracol’s defiance

For the thousands of such tenants in Goa, this exploitation ended in 1964 when the newly- elected government passed the Goa, Daman and Diu Agricultural Tenancy Act, protecting tenants from evictions. A subsequent amendment made every tiller the deemed owner of the land. These radical reforms came into effect in the 1990s, when tenants could obtain title to the land by paying nominal rates. Another law banning the sale of these lands for non-agricultural use completed the land reforms.

But for the people of Tiracol, who had just begun obtaining land titles, the world was about to be turned upside down.

Between 2007 and 2010, the erstwhile landlords sold 12 lakh square metres of the 13 lakh square metres in the village, parcel by parcel, to a Delhi-based firm, Leading Hotels Ltd. Full-page advertisements and hoardings came up in Goa, announcing “The Making of Tiracol” — a plan to redevelop the entire village into a PGA-standard golf course and resort with 188 luxury villas.

This came as a shock to most people in Tiracol. Francis remembers seeing bundles of legal papers during a visit to a fellow cashew farmer’s home. Reading them, he realised his friend had testified that he was not a farmer, and that his family never cultivated any land in Tiracol.

“I asked him and he confessed. They used to take these people to a room and ask them to sign such statements, but not allow them to bring any legal adviser,” Francis said. “They even gave them powers of attorney.”

According to records submitted to the High Court of Bombay in Goa, soon after selling the land, members of the landlord’s family approached the district administration, denying there were any tenants in Tiracol, and that the government’s records were “erroneous”. Two employees of the hotel developer had obtained powers of attorney of a number of tenants, and now appeared in court on their behalf and agreed to these claims.

Tenants were paid in cash, based on their land holding. “They were happy with ₹20 lakh, ₹30 lakh... for these people it was a lot,” Francis said.

Agreeing to the claims, the North Goa collectorate struck off tenants’ names and issued “tenancy-free certificates”, clearing Tiracol’s conversion to a golf course. There was no question of rehabilitation or resettlement either.

What ensued was a lengthy battle on the streets and in courts by a small group of tenants unwilling to part with land.

One night in 2015, the company broke ground for a road to their resort. The villagers, who had begun opposing the project, entered into skirmishes with a dozen or so bouncers hired by the firm. This shot Tiracol to statewide attention, and is still remembered across the state for a project where musclemen hurt ordinary Goans. Tiracol suddenly became a metaphor, sparking a campaign titled “Save Tiracol, Save Goa”.

Francis found himself at the centre of these developments, as a panchayat representative of Tiracol and a tenant unwilling to reverse history.

After the incident, he and other tenants formed the St Anthony’s Tenants and Mundkars Association and, overcoming financial constraints, moved public interest litigation in the High Court along with the NGO Goa Foundation, challenging the tenancy-free claims, and cases before the National Green Tribunal (NGT), questioning the golf course’s environmental approvals.

“Francis would travel in buses or hitch lifts,” remembers Sebastio Rodrigues, convener of the Bharat Mukti Morcha, a group championing the interests of oppressed classes in Goa. “He had in-depth knowledge of tenancy rights in Goa and deployed it strategically. His daring approach was an inspiration for Tiracol.”

In March 2017, the tenants won the High Court case. The court questioned how tenancy-free certificates could be issued “merely” on the basis of claims made by company representatives on behalf of tenants, when revenue records stated otherwise. The court sent the matter back to a deputy collector to re-assess the claims and determine if the collectorate’s actions were a “fraud on statute”. However, in a September order, the official reiterated that there was no tenancy in Tiracol.

Francis and his association filed another case before the HC and it is now due for final hearing. An official of Leading Hotels said on the condition of anonymity that after the deputy collector’s order, there is no restriction on commencing construction. However, the company is waiting for the HC to decide on the tenants’ plea.

Francis’s cashew plantation was the largest in Tiracol. Others who had signed off their rights had moved to cities in search of better incomes and amenities such as schools and hospitals. Ironically, the state government proposed a bridge directly to Tiracol after the golf course was planned.

A political man at heart, during the 2012 state polls Francis actively campaigned in his home constituency, Mandrem, to defeat the ruling Congress, which he claimed had enabled the land conversion for the golf course. The BJP’s Laxmikant Parsekar, who was later to become chief minister, was elected from this constituency. Yet, Francis felt betrayed by the BJP, which too supported the golf course project. When it decided to move all tenancy disputes from the local Mamlatdar offices to civil courts, Francis led a state-wide protest.

In 2017, ahead of the state elections, Francis walked up to CM Parsekar, as he was getting into his official vehicle after inaugurating a bridge, and screamed at the top of his voice, “You have betrayed Goa’s tenants!” In a video recording of the incident, Parsekar and his supporters were seen freezing to attention for the next three minutes or so, as Francis continued hollering his demands. The CM, caught sitting halfway on his seat, gaped in shock. He was defeated in the polls and the BJP-led coalition withdrew its tenancy disputes rules.

So why did Francis choose to stay on?

Before he could give me the answer, on July 30, Francis died of a sudden illness. I began seeing clues in the tributes that flowed in from across the state, crediting him with a long history of activism against projects around Tiracol, including a coal unloading jetty, and effluents from a steel plant. The news of his death was covered in all local newspapers as the death of an icon for tenants.

“He was a multifaceted person who looked at different issues not just in Tiracol but other villages too,” said Father Teo Fernandes, the Parish Priest of St Anthony’s church. “Now that he is gone we know his true value.”

Perhaps Francis left me a final clue at our last meeting in June, on the day of St Anthony’s feast. All of Tiracol had decked up for the annual celebration. Francis too had shunned his t-shirt for formals, tie included.

But a few minutes into his animated monologue, describing the latest state of affairs, a sedan pulled in. Two grey-haired siblings, a man and a woman, disembarked. Francis’s smile weakened. He grew tense as he whispered to me, “The landlord is here, don’t mention any of this” and nudged me to move to another table. From the corner of my eye, I saw him shuffle into his home and return with a tray full of Goan dishes that he served the guests. I was then asked to join in by the duo, among the many descendants of the Khalap family.

“Francis and I grew up together,” the brother told me. “His mother practically raised me.” Later, over the phone, he refused to comment on the land story.

I could not help notice that Francis, the man who could shout down the CM, appeared nervous and unsure, remaining gracefully courteous, smiling to the man’s childhood memories. But he was not himself.

“My mother and grandmother worked in their homes, cleaning utensils and cleaning after the infants,” he said with a sigh after the duo left, the sweat on his forehead drying against the sea breeze. In the distance, a ferry noiselessly crossed the river.

“This is how we lived in the past. I am old now. We can’t let this happen again.”

Nihar Gokhale is a freelance environment journalist

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