And so began an eventful, and an unforgettable, 70-day trudge through the nooks and corners of Goa. There were some 70-odd volunteers, which included a few women and two vivacious sisters, Tina and Colete Xavier, students at that time.
The pad-iatra started on October 26, 1980. Fonseca recalls that wherever they went, they received a good response. Money, small and big sums, was contributed. There were occasions too when — language being a sensitive issue in Goa — they were insulted. But they had decided not to retaliate in any way. A person spat on a young pad-iatri, Srikant Chodankar, when he knocked at his door for his contribution for the new paper. But he bravely said 'thank you' and stepped out with the others.
Two of the girls accompanying him burst into tears, as participants from that venture recall.
The eventful 'pad-iatra' ended on December 31, New Year's eve. By then, the volunteers had managed to collect around Rs 250,000, a tidy sum considering that this was just in the start of the 'eighties, when the rupee still had more value than now.
Needless to say, it took about six months to create the requisite infrastructure to launch the daily. Finding premises, purchasing machinery and recruiting the staff. When the Novem Goem first hit the stands in 1980, many naturally had great expectations that it would serve as a people's paper. Several dailies in the past had not survived for long, given the huge requirement of funds
Indeed, Novem Goem could not scale great heights; but it had many 'lows' during its span. The coverage could not be extensive, nay it was even below average. This is perhaps understandably because the publication could not engage a big team of reporters or set up a network of reporters in all corners of Goa. But it carried to work with few expectations and fewer rewards.
During the agitation, the tabloid served to keep the mass of Konkani lovers, specially in its heartland of Salcete, if it can be called that, posted of various developments. The paper served to forge a relationship and bridge the gap between the old Roman Konkani writers and those who had just started writing in the Devnagri script. Well-known poets, writers, such as Uday Bhembre, Dr Bhikaji Ganekar, Manoharrari Sardesai were among those who often contributed their writings to the paper.
The paper also sought to raise the standard of Konkani among its readers by often explaining difficult words, as compared to the poor quality of writing in most Roman script periodicals. I myself recall contributing to a column Aichim Don Utram (Today's Two Words), which gave the readers two new words to learn daily, with meanings in English and also illustrated by examples.
'Konkni uloi, Konkni boroi, Konknintlean sorkar choloi'
(Speak Konkani, Write Konkani, Administer The State In
Konkani), the slogan coined by one of the trustees,
Gurunath Kelekar, gained currency and set the mood
among Konkani lovers.
While the paper finally closed down, coincidentally, it did so after Konkani was included in the Eight Schedule of the Constitution of India and Goa was granted statehood — two of the avowed objectives for which the Trust had launched the paper. Many may be skeptical about the contribution of this small paper to these two great and important causes. But having worked in this paper for just over three years as a sub-editor, I recall that Dr Rebello, as its editor, contributed significantly to the chorus for the twin demand.