Book Review: Jason Keith Fernandes,Citizenship in a Caste Polity: Religion,Language and Belonging in Goa

Although largely unexplored, with few honourable exceptions, language politics in South Asia holds immense possibilities for understanding the everyday entanglements of democratic politics in the region. This book is an ‘anthropological account of citizenship practices’ in Goa’s caste-dominated politics. Jason Keith Fernandes provides a rich ethnographic account of the making of Konkani language ‘as a marker of Goan modernity’. He also examines the inherent challenges in the making of ‘Konkani in Nagari script’ as the basis of post-colonial Goan identity. Caught between two empires, Portuguese and British, and a belligerent Indian nationalism and proximity with Marathi speaking Bombay presidency, politics in Goa, particularly after its unification with India in 1961, is deeply embedded in its language question.

Fernandes engages with the conflicting positions of various stakeholders, both external and internal, in the language debates in post-colonial Goa. Champions of Marathi language denied Konkani its independent status, with an accusation of lack of literature and limited publication. Marathi speakers and the Portuguese speaking Goan Catholic elite considered it to be a language of Gaud Saraswat Brahmins alone. For other subaltern groups, Konkani was the language of romance, songs and everyday prayers. Konkani had to fight hard and long against the imposition of Marathi, which was already a recognized language of education and administration in Goa. To establish Konkani’s independence, language enthusiasts and organizations fought for and achieved its recognition in the Sahitya Akademi (1975); as the official language in the state (1987); as a medium of instruction in schools (the 1990s); and finally, its inclusion in the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution (1992).

After Goa’s integration into India, the first hurdle was to decide whether it would be merged with Maharashtra or kept as an ‘independent’ or autonomous region. The issue was settled through an ‘opinion poll’ in 1967 in favour of autonomy. The next hurdle was to decide what should be the legitimate marker of Goan identity in a society deeply divided in terms of caste, class and religion. That turned out to be Konkani, which united Goan citizens against the imposition of Marathi. However, a deep divide about its script remains. Although ‘Konkani written in Nagari’ is a recognized language of the state, demands from the Catholics for its recognition in the Roman script have not died down. Fernandes examines this from Goan Catholics’ perspectives and explains the inner tensions between the Catholic priests or elites and ‘subaltern’ Catholics.

The book essentially deals with ‘elite formation’, particularly the collaboration and confrontations between Gaud Saraswat Brahmins (GSB) and Catholics in post-colonial Goan society and politics. The first chapter discusses India’s citizenship debates and defines citizenship as more than a legal status. The author agrees with the assertion that citizenship is a status that provides the individuals and groups ‘room for manoeuvre’. Surprisingly, the author does not engage at all with the important works on citizenship in India by Niraja Gopal Jayal and Anupama Roy. He offers fascinating and rich ethnographic details of the persons, parties, organizations involved in the making of the Konkani Mai (Konkani as the mother) and the idealization of its true speaker—‘the Konkani Munis’ (Konkani person). According to the author, the Konkani Munis embodies the highly Sanskritized and Aryan worldviews of Saraswat Brahmins. Once the normative ideals of Konkani Munis had been set, every population group was expected to uphold them. The author examines effect of this on the citizenship-practices of Muslims, Christians and Hindu Bahujan in Goa. Although there are many references to ‘subaltern’ Goan citizens, both Catholics and Hindu Bahujan, very little attention is paid to their concerns and inner divisions. Fernandes mainly focuses on the rise to prominence of the Gaud Saraswat Brahmins in Goan politics and how Goan Catholics, particularly the supporters of ‘Konkani in Roman script’, eventually lose out. He presents a fascinating account of how Catholics have been ‘subalternized’ and ‘effectively excluded from the realm of civil society’ (p. 143), making a case about the challenges and limits of citizenship practice as a ‘free and equal membership to a political community’.

To analyse the Catholics’ experiences in Gaud Saraswat Brahmin–dominated post-colonial Goan politics, the author mainly relies, almost uncritically, on Partha Chatterjee’s conception of ‘political society’ and Sanjay Palshikar’s conception of ‘humiliation’. He argues that the Goan Catholics’ sense of vulnerability and feeling of ‘lack of authentic’ culture and identity forced them to deploy political society tactics. Political society, for the author, is a location in the polity in which the large segment of the subjects are ‘de jure citizens,’ but ‘do not de facto enjoy the privileged relationship with law that one assumes to be the case for those individuals located in civil society’ (p. 17). He does note the limits of ‘political society’, as individuals, groups and communities often oscillate between ‘civil’ and ‘political’ spaces, but its excessive and somewhat uncritical application overshadows his own fascinating and rich ethnographical account of citizenship practices.

The book’s stated objective is to understand the ‘citizenship practices in a caste polity’ particularly by Goan Catholics (p. 16), but it mainly explores elite formation in the region. It is unclear whether the author wants to explore the making of ‘Konkani as written in Nagari script’ as the marker of Goan identity and modernity; or the status and claims of the supporters of ‘Konkani in Roman scripts’. Or is it about Goan Catholics’ experience of post-colonial politics and citizenship-space in Goa? The book would have benefitted from a comparative analysis of Konkani with similar linguistic movements, such as Maithili, Bhojpuri, Assamese, Odia. As in the Konkani language movement, they are still very far from creating a ‘public space’ with equal access to every group and community.

While this book is a fascinating account of contentious language politics in post-colonial Goa and is rich in terms of ethnographic details and anecdotes on citizenship practices, its claim to provide an ‘anthropological study of citizenship’ (p. 21) beyond the legal-political status (pp. 30–31) is somewhat exaggerated, as its focus remains on inherent limits and tensions in ‘elite formations’ in post-colonial Goa.