The house of the deceased which was sealed by the forensic team at Orda, Candolim on Sunday.
Photo Credits: Agnelo Pereira
MAPUSA
A pall of gloom descended on Candolim as villagers were yet to come to terms over the sudden death of three in a family including two minor children.
Above all, the snuffing of the life of two bubbly school-going kids was more distressing.
The deceased eight year-old-boy doing his primary schooling in a Porvorim school was getting ready to take his first holy-communion on January 15 while the 14-year-old girl was studying in Class IX in Green Rosary School, Dona Paula.
“The girl was a bright student and very active in co-curricular activities in the school,” a friend of the family informed.
While the mother is a teacher in a Diocesan school in Merces, the deceased father of the kids, Joy Fernandes was known to be a God-fearing man and leading an active social life including being politically connected.
“It’s tragic and very unfortunate. He was a very good person. He was very active and influential like…he had contacts with all politicians as well as the church hierarchy. He was also a very good social worker, helping people…,” said Tomazinho Cardozo, former Speaker of the Goa Legislative Assembly and a resident of Candolim.
Joy also had a creative streak and was active in the world of tiatrs, a very popular source of entertainment among the Konkani loving people in the State.
“He used to write scripts for tiatrs and even directed several tiatrs,” said Fermino Fernandes, Sarpanch of Candolim village panchayat.
The deceased was employed at the Konkani Academy at the instance of Tomazinho Cardozo some two decades back but later quit the job and was on his own since then.
Very well known among the clergy, recently he was offered a deal to run a canteen at Agnel Ashram, Pilar and was supposed to start work on January 17.
He unsuccessfully contested the Zilla Panchayat election from Calangute in 2017.
The villagers were in a state of shock and disbelief and could not digest the fact that the father could take such a drastic step.
“A very well-balanced person can take such a decision is what bothers me,” Cardozo said.
