Gaunkars from South and North Goa met to celebrate Gaunkari Day and pledged to keep the spirit of the gaunkar alive despite attempts being made to stifle traditions set a thousand and more years back.
Gaunkar Felix Braganza from Batim Comunidade was lauded by the gaunkars present, who raised a toast to him for thwarting the attempts of his panchayat to circumvent his gaunkari rights.
The gaunkars declared themselves free from state landlordism and decided to continue to rid themselves of corrupt elements and spread the original ethos amongst the youngsters in the community.
The gaunkars were united in the view that the government is using its administrative agencies for community land grabbing, thus becoming rank land grabbers.
“There are many judgments of the Goa bench of the Bombay High Court that enforce the provisions of the Code of Comunidades in force prior to 20-12/1961 thus proving that there is no Revenue Administration District of the Central government covering the state of Goa,” emphasised legal luminary on the Code of Comunidades, Adv Andre Pereira.
“The order of the High Court of Bombay at Goa passed on 27-10-2021 in Writ petition no 754 of 2021 (F) observed that the State of Goa is not constituted of Revenue Administration District foreseen under Section 6 of Goa Land Revenue Code 1968,” explained Adv Andre.
Gaunkars from Benaulim, Batim, Curtorim, Nerul, Pilerne, Olaulim, Aldona and Mormugao were part of the gathering celebrating Gaunkari Day.