06 March 2007

Not sun and sand, but land

For once, news about Goa is not feel-good. The current issue of Down to Earth focuses on the ongoing development (sic) tussle in Goa. I think the article is pay-walled, so cant link it here.

A Goan friend and I were once discussing this tendency of how certain kind of stories get billed as 'what people are interested in' and certain others are not. Like, for instance, most news from Goa that you have read would have something to do with tourism, film festival, etc. But what about the story that unfolds after the tourists have left? Goa has a huge waste disposal problem, thanks to all of us rushing there, and creating crap. But this is not a nice Goan story. So, let that be.

And I told my Goan friend how the most hard-hitting of Bengal's stories never get reported outside the state. It's an inverse logic here that news editors follow. Like, Singur, they said, was what happens in Bengal day in and day out. So, let's focus on emerging Bengal stories, eh? (The Telegraph, by the way, specialises in the emerging Bengal section.)

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey there Viju!
I hope you can place me:) It's been ages since we've interacted... got your addy from Dev's site.
Btw, I finally created a blog of my own in late January this year.
Do visit it when you find the time.
Have a great day!

Vijayalaxmi Hegde said...

Oho en saar idu!! Of course, I remember you da. You still at Vijay Times? How have you been man?

Anonymous said...

Puleeeze... Vijay Times is a forgotten dream.

Anonymous said...

Been recently to goa. I feel the problem is not really tourists but how we Indians let ourselves to be treated. Tourists from any part of the world will behave if they are made too. What i saw on the beach was this:
Any Indian who interacts with a tourist is either begging, trying to sell you something or is serving you food on the table.
We definitely lack self esteem to such an extent that we feel a tourist can better our lives with a little money from their pockets.

so if a tourist assumes that he/she can do whatever he/she wants , we have allowed them to think so.

Kiran
kiranchakra at gmail dot com
Bangalore

Vijayalaxmi Hegde said...

Hey Kiran, welcome :)

Well, it might be tourists or the way people react to tourists. But I was referring to the broader development debate. What is development? At what cost, whose cost? And at whose benefit? These questions keep getting repeated all over India. In Goa, it might be the luxury, tourism industry, elsewhere, some other sharks...

Anonymous said...

I fully agree with you on this, Viju. You see, many a time the State is hand-in-glove with big corporations who churn money dreams by promising a better more prosperous future for the people they displace.
In reality, these cunning land sharks are ravaging the present while providing no hope for a tomorrow at all.
Environmental degradation happens right under the noses of government officials who look the other way because they have been bought over.
It is then up to the citizens, who through their initiatives, let the powers-that-be know a thing or two about screwing up their precious lands and resources.
"Progress is necessary. But would it translate itself into a worthy achievement if it comes at the expense of sacrificing our flora and fauna?" is how I began one of my articles that dealt with the disappearance of all kinds of birds, notably the sparrow, from Bangalore.

Anonymous said...

Please do visit the this blog
http://goadourado.sulekha.com/ for your posting on Not sun and sand, but land