Goa: History
This is a collection of articles archived for the excellence of their content. |
The colonial era
Football: 1883-1951
Marcus Mergulhao, Dec 19, 2021: The Times of India
PANAJI: In 2012, when then chief minister Manohar Parrikar declared football as the state sport, a first for any state in India, everyone applauded the decision. But in reality, it really shouldn’t have taken so long for the government to realise the influence of football on Goans.
Football, after all, has been more than just a sport ever since Fr William Robert Lyons, a visiting British priest, first brought the game to Goa in 1883.
Throughout the twentieth century, football remained an important part of expatriate relations with Goa as the best teams from Bombay, now Mumbai, were touring the state, then under Portuguese rule.
St Mary’s College landed here as early as 1905 to play friendlies against Panjim Boys, while by the 1940s, prominent teams like Young Goans and BEST were also making their presence felt.
The Portuguese knew what football meant to Goans, so during the crucial decade prior to Liberation when pressure was building on the colonial powers to relinquish hold over foreign lands, the Salazar regime did everything it could to convince Goa they were in good hands.
Football was their biggest tool.
“The Portuguese made some last-ditch attempts to create in Goans an awareness of the benefits of European rule and of their ties to the Iberian state. Football proved to be an important means of attempting to promote this cultural association and of highlighting the effectiveness of Portuguese administration,” James Mills notes in, ‘Colonialism, Christians and Sport: The Catholic Church and Football in Goa, 1883-1951’.
Starting from 1955, tours of major teams from around the Portuguese empire were arranged, with Ferroviario de Lourenco Marques being the first to play here. The Mozambique-based club attracted a crowd of 20,000 for each of its two matches.
Four years later, Pakistan’s leading football team, Port Trust Club of Karachi, landed here, “symbolising the solidarity of two anti-India footballing nations”. But the most famous of them all was, no doubt, the visit of European giants SL Benfica in 1960.
“Benfica's tour of Portuguese Goa in 1960 was seemingly intended to remind indigenous subjects of their imperial connections and responsibilities,” Todd Cleveland wrote in, ‘Following the Ball: The Migration of African Soccer Players Across the Portuguese Colonial Empire’.
Significantly, governor-general Vassalo e Silva was present for two of the three games that Benfica played in Goa.
Football was also provided pride of place as the sport was separated from others, governed by the Conselho de Desportos da India Portuguesa which, as its name suggests, was a general sports council.
Instead, the Associacao Futebol de Goa (now Goa Football Association) was formed on December 22, 1959.
Rock eras
Gauree.Malkarnekar, Goa’s 16 rock eras tell Earth’s story, May 22, 2017: The Times of India
Goa may be embedded with India’s oldest rocks, trondhjemite gneiss, but the tiny state is also one of the most geologically diverse regions. If you traverse Goa’s 3,702-square-kilometre expanse, you will be walking across as many as 16 geological eras say geologists.
Trondhjemite gneiss formations found at Anmod Ghat have been recorded to be over 3.4 billion years old, followed by the gneiss formation at Palolem in Canacona. Meanwhile, the rock formations on the north Goa beach belt date back 2.5 billion years. Compare this to the fact that modern mammals as wells as hominoids appeared on Earth only 65 million years ago.
Scientist Nandkumar Kamat says we need to create thematic ancient pre-cambrian geological parks to spread knowledge about the existence of this natural heritage, not just at Anmod Ghat and Palolem, but also at “Dudhsagar/Colem/Castelrock and Chandranath/ Paroda”, where important rock formations have been identified
The age of the granites found at Dudhsagar and Chandranath are believed to be 2.6 billion years old.
The gneiss and schists have folded several times and their merging with other newer rocks has led to different formations.“These trondhjemite gneiss rocks have undergone a change from ingenious rocks to metamorphic rocks over a long period of time due to heat and pressure. At many places, granite rocks have turned into gneiss because of metamorphism,” says geographer F M Nadaf.
