Our Comunidades are an important thread in the rich tapestry of Goa’s rural community living, that was the successor of the “Gauncaria” system which pre-existed prior the Portuguese occupation. One type of members in a Comunidade are its “Gauncars” who are purported to be the descendants of the original settlers of the village.
Article 20 (1) of the Legislative Diploma no. 2070 dated 15.04.1961 (Code of Comunidades) vests the right to receive “Zonn” and to be inducted as a “Gaunkar” of the Comunidade only in the male heir of a “Gaunkar”. This pre-requisite to be a “Gaunkar” and to receive “Zonn” has been the convention since the inception of the Comunidades as well its predecessors, however archaic it may sound. The Comunidade is a living institution and has stood the test of time for centuries and it is imperative that it also imbibes the values of the modern day.
The practice may have been rooted in a treaty between the Portuguese and the then village elders in Goa called the “Foral de Usos e Costumes dos Gaucares” (1526), wherein the Portuguese agreed to adhere to the existing native customs and traditions. But these traditions and private laws do not hold in a modern-day Comunidade that is striving for relevance and struggling for survival along with a dwindling community of “Gauncars”.
I strongly hold issue with those who are advocating status quo. Article 14 of our Constitution lays down that all are equal before the law and have equal protection of it, and Article 15 prohibits discrimination on the grounds of gender. In other words, all stand equal before the law, with equal rights and free from unjust discrimination. Hence, it is highly unreasonable and beyond me as to how we are still following such a discriminatory practice of excluding daughters from the right of “Zonn” and to be “Gauncars”. Daughters by the fundamental rights guaranteed to them in the Constitution of India ought to be accorded these rights bestowed by the Code.
As a “Gaunkar” of Verna village, I feel it is high time that female heirs of “Gauncars” ought to be given the right to receive "Zonn" and to be inducted as “Gauncars”. To me, the amount of “Zonn” is irrelevant, but the right of the woman to attachment and belonging to her village - alongside her male counterparts “ is paramount.
In my opinion, exclusion of daughters from Gauncarship is an unreasonable classification stuck in archaic customs and traditions that leave out one half of humanity for no validly acceptable reason in the modern day. In the Sabarimala case, our Apex Court struck down a rule preventing women from worshipping Lord Ayyappa in the Sabarimala temple observing that “'devotion cannot be subjected to gender discrimination”. If devotion is not subject to gender discrimination, neither is the Comunidade, and it is high time that amendments addressing this gender bias are introduced.
[The writer is president of the Margao Comunidade]
