Political colour to tiatr
I am a great lover of theatre and have rarely missed a good English play, Konkani natak or tiatr in the last many years. Unfortunately the staging of English plays and Konkani nataks in Goa is very rare and far in between. However we have a lot of tiatrs being dished out every now and then. My criterion for selection of plays (whether English or Konkani) was, is and will always remain only humour. However, tiatrs over the years have had natural comedians and people trying hard to be comedians or comediennes. A vast majority of the tiatr going public has only three questions to ask while choosing its tiatr 1) Who are the singers? 2) Who are the comedians? 3) Are there any “political songs”? (which actually means whether there are any songs bashing the politicians).
Some years back I was watching a show wherein there were many politician bashing songs before the interval. Half of the then Cabinet was exposed for its corruption. As soon as the lights came on at interval, it was announced that two of the cast members (husband and wife team) were releasing a VCD. Imagine my shock and surprise at seeing one of the most corrupt ministers of that regime, walk up the dais as chief guest to release the disc. The audience could not control their laughter.
James Monteiro, Loutulim
Dengue spread in Delhi
The death of Avinash and now Aman, both shunted to various hospitals with dengue have raised alarm bells. Avinash was turned down by at least five hospitals thus wasting precious time .The lame excuse that there is no bed, pediatrician, facilities and medicines. Nobody wanted to take risk and responsibility with a poor child fighting desperately to live and surviveWhen he finally breathed his last, the heart broken parents of this only child committed suicide.
The negligence to critical patients by doctors, managers, private hospitals is because they are driven by purely profit motives, The prime land leased to hospitals is conditional on free treatment to such needed patients. Will the leases now withdrawn of such erring hospitals?
Nelson Lopes Chinchinim
Service taxes on premiums
I was going through the previous receipt of my car insurance and started wondering why service tax was charged on premium. Does the premium of any kind of insurance warrant service tax? Service tax is applicable when someone provide us a service in any form. In this case, Service tax is applicable on complete premium including PA covers and third party liability, That means the premium what I was being charged is for service and actual premium value is nil for sum assured.
Why are people are not coming forward to fight against such taxes? There are many commerce graduates, finance consultants and educated people who can raise their voices against such taxes.
Sunil Lotlikar, Margao
