The Goa State of Mind

Murders and bomb blasts, it seems, can do little to jolt this sunny state out of its complacency. Such is life here.

Susegad: a term as synonymous with Goa as sun, sea and sand. And while it’s the latter three that brings people to Goa, it’s susegad that keeps them here. To Goans, it means many things and the definition changes as many times as the number of people you ask. Lazy, chilled out and in no particular hurry to get anywhere. In short, nothing that can startle anyone.

Except that when you see susegad suspend reality, you do begin to wonder. Anywhere else, news headlines like ‘Serial Killer Kills 10’ and ‘Blast in Madgao on Diwali Eve’ are enough to turn people paranoid and the government tense. But in unflappable Goa, these seem like impolite intrusions—like ranting neighbours who don’t understand that a hammock view must always be upwards, or seawards, never sideways.

My assignment doesn’t afford me the luxury of any such suspension, so here goes. It all began early last week as ten bodies showed up in the space of three days, all within 30 km of the state capital Panaji. Two bodies—of a man and woman—were fished out of the sea at Morjim; elsewhere, a family of four ragpickers was found dumped in the Panaji Creek with head injuries and strangulation marks; and more gruesome still, four other bodies were discovered in various parts of Goa, three of them partly burnt and one with rubber slippers covering her vital organs.

It could give anyone nightmares. But Goa seemed to have it all under control. The two bodies found in the sea were dubbed a suicide pact. Four people were arrested for the murder of the family of ragpickers. All this was done in record time, and now the only thing that stood between the state police and their Diwali holiday was the four other murders—three of which had a former Goa CM and everyone else eager to label as the work of a psychopath, supporting evidence for which has turned out to be as solid as a sandcastle under a breaking sea wave.

This would have been Goa’s second serial killer after Mahanand Naik, Goa’s very own Jack the Ripper or Dupatta Killer, was arrested this April for strangulating 16 women over 15 years. An arrest rendered a little unnecessary if Goa Home Minister Ravi Naik’s sartorial solution was anything to go by. He asked women of the state “not to wear dupattas with their churidars” because that’s what Mahanand Naik was using to strangle his victims. It was really quite simple.

This time, the Goa police didn’t want to wait that long. With alarming alacrity, they placed the case under the charge of Manjunath Desai, an officer who was a police inspector in Ponda where Mahanand Naik had used the dupatta—that sheer, delicate piece of chest fabric that monitors modesty—as a murder weapon for years on end. If this was an odd form of reassurance for justice seekers, Goa’s Director General of Police Bhimsen Bassi did not add to it by blaming the entire Goa police force for the poor state of public security—and hastening to add, “We’re still investigating whether any officer was involved in the case.”

As for the four unsolved murders, two men were arrested as suspects from Mumbai as early as Friday, Diwali eve. These were not cases of sexual abuse, declared the cops, but robbery. Such haste was missing when it came to the post-mortem examination of the bodies, though—for close to three days, autopsies were not conducted because police forensic experts could not. “Such delays happen,” was the snappy explanation of Atmaram Deshpande, superintendent of police, Criminal Investigation Department (CID).

Despite all the effort, the scenario wasn’t quite set for Diwali. Late Friday evening, there was another rude interruption. In the port town of Madgao, as an effigy of Narkasur was ritually being set ablaze to send the demon where he’s supposed to belong, a flaming intimation of hell hit the gathering—in the form of a low-intensity bomb blast. A scooter had blown up, killing two people. Small explosive devices were recovered from three other places, suggesting plans for a coordinated terror attack. But the rest of Madgao refused to surrender its susegad. It kept up the festivities.

The writing though was writ large on the wall. It was going to be a working Diwali for the Goa Police, except the aforementioned CID superintendent, who has since taken leave of his job (in his defence though, in conversation with Open last week he had mentioned such plans). Either way, a blast is a blast. So investigations were pressed forth, the state was placed on high alert, ownership details of the explosives-laden scooter were sought, and its owner Nishad Bakhle quickly detained. But then, susegad spares nobody, not even the Regional Transport Office; so it emerged that Bakhle had sold the scooter to someone, and the clerks had been too lazy to have done the paperwork required to identify who. This was an oversight dutifully confirmed by Deputy Inspector General Ravindra S Yadav.

Regardless, investigations went on. A trail was sniffed out that led from the two alleged riders of the scooter—Malgondi Patil, who died in the blast, and Yogesh Naik, still in critical condition—to a radical Hindu outfit called Sanatan Sanstha, said to be preparing for a dharmayudh (religious war) under the cover of a research programme to obtain scientific endorsement for religious/mystical practices. According to police investigators, this was the group behind an earlier series of blasts in Thane, Panvel and Vashi, near Mumbai, apart from an outbreak of riots in Miraj, Maharashtra, and the stopping of an MF Husain film’s screening at the Goa International Film Festival in 2008. Goa’s Congress-led coalition government is now said to be toying with the idea of banning Sanatan Sanstha.

The gelatin sticks used in the blast were quickly ascertained to have been procured from Nagpur—since ‘Suraj Industries Ltd’ was written on them. This was going to be a high-profile case, only someone in the police forgot to authorise an autopsy (even four days after the event), a fact that the doctor in-charge at the Goa Medical College confirmed. In a press meet, Ravindra Yadav too confirmed that the ‘forensic report’ was still awaited. Meanwhile, as other officers ran around like headless chicken, there didn’t seem to be any consensus on whether anyone had been arrested. Yes, said Yadav. Other senior officers thought otherwise. Ravi Naik, the state home minister, seemed to be under the impression that all the six ‘detained’ had been arrested.

Somewhere in all this chaos came Diwali, and Chief Minister Digambar Kamat—whose switch from the BJP to Congress in 2004 tilted the state’s Assembly in the latter’s favour—was too busy with his pooja to make any statement. Reporters who sought a comment on the blast were offered sweets at his residence. The next day brought no greater urgency on the CM’s part. This left Ravi Naik to mutter something darkly about the Sanatan Sanstha links of the wife of a cabinet colleague, Sudhin Dhavalikar, who happens to be a coalition partner seen to have sabotaged Naik’s own chances of chief ministership.

The Sanatan Sanstha, which has proclaimed its innocence, has its headquarters in Ponda, where an elaborate memorial to Shivaji greets you just as you reach. The ashram building is blissfully quiet, except for a solitary police car, which too drives off once an officer descends the steps with copies of the Sanstha’s brochures. Outside, a couple of constables hang around yawning. Inside, life goes on as if nothing has happened; disciples chant mantras and the ashram bookshop makes a quick buck selling fiery literature to curious journalists. The biggest grouse of the outfit’s spokesperson is that Sanstha members now have to report to the police station at ungodly hours like 8.30 am and stay till 7 pm.

In Tandeowli village, home of Yogesh Naik, the 26-year-old co-accused has gained instant fame. A farmer who spent extra time teaching special children and tending to his garden, his family says his only link with the Sanstha was that he supplied the ashram 25 litres of milk every day.

Back at the police headquarters in Panaji, Inspector General Yadav walks in an hour late for a press briefing he had called. He stumbles through the event, confusing himself about the name of the editor of Sanatan Prabhat and the number of arrests made in the Thane-Panvel-Vashi blast cases, before attempting to explain the difference between a ‘detected’ and ‘undetected’ case. There is also some grandstanding on the small matter of the Sanstha’s link with Dhavalikar’s wife. “For the police, it doesn’t matter if someone is rich or poor or well connected,” Yadav says, boastfully.

Perhaps it’s just as well that a Special Investigations Team has taken charge. Goa’s beach life, of course, wouldn’t have noticed either way. Visitors are still descending by the planeload. None of them have been sent by a distant Portuguese monarch, and none of them will leave a legacy like St Francis Xavier’s. But soon enough, someone will have to come down here to unravel exactly what’s going on.

GoaPondaSanatan Sanstha