A love for the environment is as much a part of Goan culture as fish curry and rice. A long history of environmental struggles bears witness to a strong environmental consciousness in Goa that is intrinsically linked to local livelihoods, sustenance and ideas of wellbeing.
After Portuguese rule ended, one of the earliest struggles was against the environmentally destructive Zuari Agrochemicals, that also catalysed the Fishworkers movement in the state and across India.
This was soon followed by the massive and long standing agitation against the Konkan Railway; several controversies erupted around tourism projects that took over the coastal areas from especially the 1980s; agitations against Du Pont (Nylon 6,6); and Metastrips.
Or more recently against the Regional Plan 2011 and 2021; Special Economic Zones (SEZs); Mopa Airport; Coal Corridor and Mormugao Port Expansion; and Declaration of Rivers as National Waterways.
Each of these projects were initiated in the name of Development without taking into account the harm to the local environment, livelihoods or culture. In reality, they helped a few private capitalists at great public cost.
This vibrant living history of struggles over the environment in Goa is the subject of the Living Histories of Land in Goa Mobile Museum. The Museum documents and archives this living heritage that may not find its way in text books, but is very much a part of Goan ethos and consciousness.
