Reading local news dailies a day after the
demise of Manohar Parrikar gave an impression that the news dailies were
interceding with the creator to accept the departed chief minister of Goa
directly to heaven.
The coalition government in Goa that the departed
chief minister led was not very different from a prostitution den. Prior 2012,
Manohar Parrikar did not miss an opportunity to point out acts of omission and
commission of the politicians like Pandurang Madkaikar, Vishwajit Rane, and
Vijay Sardessai. Parrikar had even filed criminal cases against Mauvin Godinho
in power scam.
His glorification in the newspapers was to
such an extent that it painted a rosy picture of an individual and a politician
without any blemish.
In stark contrast late Manohar Parrikar was
vindictive, arrogant and highly communal. It does not end there he did not have
respect for law and order and above all a tyrannical, despotic, autocratic and
manipulative as chief minister who did not believe in morals, principles and
moreover democratic norms. He conducted himself as a ‘know it all’ personality.
In all the matters it was his way all the way.
Can we forget way back in 2004, he tried to
cling to power by bodily lifting Velim MLA Filipneri Rodrigues out of the Assembly?
That was the black day for law and order in the State of Goa, as policemen were
used as ‘Marshals’ of the Assembly for this act. Have we forgotten the school
rape victim, whose investigation was allowed to run cold before handing it over
to the CBI or for that matter the killers of Fr. Bismarck are still at large.
In more recent times, somewhere after
Parrikar took over the reins of state in 2012, hooligans and goons were
informed about a group of activists having a meeting about the ill-effects of
illegal mining allowed by his government in Margao and the activists were held
captive, threatened to kill and rescued after hours of anxiety.
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| Adolf Hitler |
The late chief minister of Goa was highly
manipulative. Have we forgotten Francis Pereira ‘Boy’ who was arrested by the
police in desecration of places of worship? When the courts discharged him from
most of the false cases against him, Francis blasted Parrikar for personally
requesting him to take the blame for it in exchange for money and government
job for his nephew.
Part-time CM (he never completed a single
term in office) had a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde personality. He would proclaim
his love for Goa but do quite the contrary. Was it not on his watch that
regional plan 2011 was designed by his then minister Babush Monserrate which
made people rise in unison against it. Was it not during his term as chief
minister that the loot and plunder of natural resources of Goa commenced?
After 2004, he bounced back to power in 2012
with promises of saving Goa, packing the casinos out of river Mandovi. The
answer is for all to see. Infact he allowed the number of casinos to increase
in the river and the Congress had aptly said that the casinos were the ATMs of
the BJP.
Just as it said that leopard never changes
its spots, the autocratic and despotic chief minister of Goa also did not
change his crooked ways and means. If in 2004 he used muscle power to remain in
power but was sacked by Governor S C Jamir. In 2017 he used dirty tricks to
cobble the numbers in the Assembly and attained power, when the people had
refused BJP the mandate. This time round the creator seems to have had enough
of the mess and dismissed him from the face of the earth.
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| Idi Amin |
The news dailies called him great leader,
able administrator, visionary blah, blah. Did his vision have a goal? If so why
is the economy of state in doldrums? Why is the standard of education very low?
Why disciplinary force (police) in the state is most undisciplined?
Former chief minister Laxmikant Parsekar once
said that Parrikar has not left anything for him to borrow money from. For the
few months the administration is find it difficult to pay salaries to
government employees. In some cases staff has not been paid for couple of
months. PWD contractors are begging to be paid for the work carried out.
Cops have been caught red-handed accepting bribes;
some have even raped their own colleagues and minors. The goons in uniform
assaulted a family in full public view at Fatorda stadium and at Assolna out
post. These are just some examples to indicate that under the term of chief
minister late Manohar Parrikar and news papers portrayed him otherwise upon his
death.
There is old saying, “if you do not read
newspapers you’re uninformed and if you read you’re misinformed.” The hat fits
the current dailies.
Maybe, the news dailies through their
journalists were paying back Parrikar for all the goodies and schemes he
designed to muzzle the media person. Those journalists who would not fall for
his bait were targeted.
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| Antonio de Oliveira Salazar |
But the same politicians were his cabinet
colleagues after the 2017 assembly elections. It is an established norm that
the chief minister chief picks-up his cabinet and Manohar Parrikar chose the
same names he bitterly opposed and criticized. This indicated the moral
character of the person.
For late Manohar Parrikar, morals and values never
mattered as long as he was in ‘power’. To the extent that though he knew he was
dying he clung to power and when his government was on shaky grounds, he
dropped two ailing ministers late Francis D’souza and Pandurang Madkaikar but he
held on to power till his last breath.
To take a small sneak into his acts of
vindictiveness, the most recent was the dismissal of his mentor’s son from a
private car company. Prior to that, during 2002-2004 he orchestrated raids on
the hospital run by most respected Dr. Francisco Colaco and establishments
owned by businessman Datta Naik. The transfer of a young judge, who passed an
order to search the official residence of Union Defence minister, is yet
another incident and the hounding of Margao MLA Digambar Kamat in the illegal
mining cases and Louis Berger is still red hot.
This is just a tip of the iceberg, one can
write volumes of wrong-doings of a dictator called Manohar Parrikar, but the
journalists of all new dailies existing in Goa projected only the rosy picture
of him.
There is a notion somewhere that one should
not say or write hurtful stuff about the dead, but all the time we learn, read
about cruel dictators like Adolf Hitler, Antonio de Oliveira Salazar, Idi Amin all
the time. Manohar Parrikar was Goa’s dictator indeed. Whether he was all rosy
as it was portrayed by the news dailies is for people to judge.
It is time to show the mirror to the
journalists who have become of puppets of politicians.
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