Dalgado and the Konkani-Marathi Controversy - 2
Mgr. Dalgado’s entry into the Konkani-Marathi controversy was a watershed moment in the history of Konkani Studies. Contemporaneous Portuguese-language newspapers in Goa and bilingual newspapers in Bombay commented on that priest’s efforts in the field.[1] After him, Jules Bloch in his La formation de la lingue marathe[2] showed how distinct Marathi was from Konkani. S. M. Katre paralleled Bloch’s book by writing The Formation of Konkani[3] and, together with V. P. Chavan, helped further Konkani’s position as a separate language.
Meanwhile, Vaman Raghunath Sinai Varde Valaulikar (1877-1946), who used the pen name Shenoi Goembab, was an important Konkani scholar of the first half of the 20th century. He began by writing in Marathi. However, after a writer from Bombay remarked that his Marathi was “artificially flavoured”, because “Marathi is not your spoken language,”[4] Valaulikar switched to Konkani, and initially wrote in the Roman script. Konkani in the Devanagari script was not worth the name in Bombay, and much less in Goa.
While Valaulikar’s crusading voice primarily addressed the upper-class Hindu community in Bombay, it complemented Dalgado’s work of demonstrating Konkani’s individuality to a larger audience. His Konknnichi Vyakornni Bandavoll[5] provided a detailed grammatical analysis through which Konkani emerged supreme over Marathi.[6] Valaulikar, who knew Portuguese, must have read Dalgado’s 1917 rejoinder. Perhaps the two never met or exchanged correspondence, but they shared a vision for their mother tongue, in particular, the choice of script: Devanagari.
Dalgado died in Lisbon in 1922, after decades dedicated to research in the field of Konkani and culture. His academic legacy was maintained by his pupil Mariano Saldanha, who replaced him as a professor of Sanskrit at the University of Lisbon in 1929, taught Konkani at Escola Superior Colonial’s Institute of African and Oriental Languages and conducted extensive research on Konkani in Goa and Europe.
In 1952, Saldanha was in Bombay as the president of the Fifth All-India Konkani Porixod. Unlike Dalgado, his guru, he was a votary of the Roman script, and his address to the Conference was printed in the said script. Shenoi Goembab had died six years earlier, in 1946, after a lifetime of activism in favour of Konkani.
By the 1950s, the demand for linguistic states in India had gained significant momentum leading to the creation of the Telugu-speaking Andhra out of the State of Madras. Much earlier, the Indian National Congress (INC), then the country’s foremost political party, had organized its provincial committees along linguistic zones, signalling an early form of the concept. Valaulikar’s vision of Konkani in the Devanagari script dovetailed into that concept, while, in Lisbon, Saldanha was officially working on the possible introduction of Konkani in the Roman script for primary schools in Portuguese Goa. Obviously, that plan did not materialise in post-1961 Goa under Indian rule.
Konkani post-1961
It was an entirely new ballgame after Goa joined the Indian Union. The neighbouring state of Maharashtra, deeming Konkani a dialect of Marathi, soon laid claim to Goa. Goans who formed the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) were fifth columnists who aided the designs of that expansionist state. The United Goans Party (UGP) stood opposite, favouring administrative autonomy in the form of a Union Territory and eventual Statehood for Goa.
In the 1960s, the Goan elite, which was hitherto divided between Portuguese and Marathi suddenly realised that only Konkani could help preserve the Goan identity. It was a David and Goliath situation, in which Konkani won, because there could be no arguments against facts: the language was on the people’s lips and nobody could take that away. Its literature was perhaps not on par with the best in the country, but Dalgado and Valaulikar had widened and strengthened its base.
Valaulikar is rightly regarded as the ‘Father of Modern Konkani Literature’; Dalgado ought to be titled as the Grand Father (pun intended) of Modern Konkani because of his fundamental research contribution to the development of the language. Eventually, their impact was felt during the Opinion Poll (1967), which was an unprecedented referendum held in Goa to ascertain the people’s wishes vis-à-vis Maharashtra’s territorial claim. The contribution of the two stalwarts came into sharp focus again when Sahitya Akademi recognised Konkani as a literary language (1975), with no mention of the script.
The stage was now set for Konkani to become the official language of the soon-to-be 25th State of the Indian Union. Curiously, even at this late hour, there was a tussle between Konkani and Marathi in Goa. Finally, the Goa, Daman and Diu Official Language Act, 1987,[7] passed in the Goa Legislative Assembly on 2 May 1987 granted Konkani official status.
Nonetheless, by a twist of fate, the official language was defined as “Konkani language in Devanagari script” with the use of Marathi for all or any official purposes. While Konkani speakers as a whole heaved a sigh of relief on seeing the language of the land being accorded official status, the pinch of that definition slowly but surely made itself felt. On the one hand, supporters of Marathi were placated, and on the other, supporters of Konkani written in the Roman script were angered. Olivinho Gomes dubs it a “defective definition”, stating that “it was exactly like saying that “woman” means a female clad in a saree, leading to the fallacious conclusion that females not wearing such attire were not women at all.”[8]
Goa gained statehood less than four months later, on 30 May 1987; and on 31 August 1992, Konkani was included in the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution. The language had clearly come into a privileged position, as never before. It would seem that a time to consolidate had arrived, but, alas, the Act had sowed seeds of disunity. The Konkani community that uses the Roman script and is largely Catholic felt discriminated against. This section of the people and the Roman script, both of which had all the while been a bulwark of Konkani, suddenly felt marginalised. From state employment and the structure of the literary advisory committee of the local Kala Academy right to the attribution of national awards by the Sahitya Akademi, Konkani became synonymous with the Devanagari script alone, whereas the Roman script almost became a scripta non grata.
The Catholic Church of Goa, in collaboration with seven Konkani-speaking dioceses (Bombay, Poona, Karwar, Belgaum, Sindhudurg, Mangalore, and Chikmagalur), which constitute the Konkani province of the Indian Church hierarchy, implemented the use of Konkani in its jurisdiction (liturgy; translation of the Bible and documents; hymnals; and medium of instruction in the diocesan primary schools, etc.). But alas, the Church in Goa failed to actively support the inclusion of the Roman script in the Language Act.[9]
Meanwhile, the Dalgado Konkani Akademi (DKA), established in 1989, helped keep the flame of the Roman script alive. It took some time for its activities to gain momentum, given the lack of funds. In the financial year 2007-08, state funds were made available and the official body, Goa Konkani Akademi, was directed to provide for the publication of books written in the Roman script. DKA, in addition to providing a forum for writers, poets, and dramatists, gave birth to the Tiatr Academy of Goa.[10] Even though naming the Academy after an advocate of the Devanagari script seemed incongruous, all in all it helped keep the stalwart’s memory alive.
Case for the Roman script
Whereas a script ought to be a facilitator, it has become a bone of contention. In the Konkani world, the multi-script situation, which could well be considered a plus point, has become an Achilles heel. The sooner this is resolved, the better, to ensure the interests of all the user communities, whose happiness and wellbeing is bound to popularise the language. The more the scripts, the better.
In 2013, the Sahitya Akademi organised a conference on the theme “One Language, Many Scripts”. There were representatives from several Indian languages, some of them still using multiple scripts. They appreciated the Akademi’s initiative to have an open dialogue on the issue. Even though the official report of the Conference concludes that all the speakers “admitted that a language will not prosper with multiple scripts”, it is undeniable that there were those who opined that the occurrence of many scripts is a sign of vibrancy that must be celebrated. “There was a general consensus that Sahitya Akademi should maintain status quo on this issue at present… The scholars appreciated and welcomed this significant step taken by Sahitya Akademi to open a dialogue on this sensitive issue.”[11]
So, the matter is by no means settled. This is therefore a time to reflect on whether the shared legacy of Dalgado and Shenoi Goembab has been put to creative use. It would be interesting to consider what their response would be in the context of our globalised world. How would they look at demands for the State recognition of the Roman script in today’s multilingual and multicultural world? Would they not consider it an opportunity to woo back Konkani speakers at home and in the diaspora and to win new speakers from across the world? Would they not appreciate the possibility of Konkani finally becoming a means of communication and identity marker?
Living languages are dynamic, and no script is perfect, much less eternal. For example, Goykanadi was the earliest known native script that Konkani used until replaced by other scripts. Similarly, the Anglo-Saxon futhorc was the earliest known English language script. However, in England, from the seventh century onwards, the futhorc coexisted with the Latin alphabet which then gradually replaced it. No one pines for the futhorc. The same is true of Turkey, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, and other countries that have given up their traditional scripts in favour of the Roman script to safeguard the future of the language.
A similar phenomenon occurred in Goa five centuries ago. With the arrival of the Portuguese, the Roman script became Konkani’s survival instrument. This script, which has been around for several centuries in India, is therefore not to be considered foreign; it is as Indian as the country’s English language. If the English language can be made the country’s official language alongside Hindi, so can the Roman script be made official alongside the Devanagari, given that the numbers and the production volume justify it.
To not let script become a divisive issue, would not Dalgado and Shenoi Goembab, then, consider letting Goa become the first state in the Indian Union to successfully adopt a multi-script situation? Any script that has worked in the past ought to work in the future as well, maybe with some refinement. This is true of both the Roman and the Devanagari script. Surely, Dalgado’s mission was to save the language over and above the script.
(First published in Revista da Casa de Goa, Series II, No. 38, Jan-Feb 2026, ISSN 2184-7045)
The first part of this article appeared on this blog on 20 September 2023.
References
[1] Rochelle Pinto, Between Empires: Print and Politics in Goa (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 113. Among other issues, the book notes the emergence of the Konkani language press in Bombay while the Goan elite sponsored the Portuguese language press in Goa.
[2] Paris, 1920.
[3] Bombay: Karnatak Press, 1942.
[4] Kiran Budkuley, Shenoi Goembab: The Man and his Work (Margão: Asmitai Pratisthan, 2003), p. 36.
[5] Bombay: Gomantak Press, 1947.
[6] Olivinho Gomes, Konkani Literature in Roman Script: A Brief History, Panjim: Dalgado Konknni Akademi, 2010, p. 174. The book dubs the Official Language Act, 1987, the political genocide of those demanding equal status to Konkani in the Roman script.
[7] Act No. 5 of 1987, in the Official Gazette, Series I, No. 7, dated 14 May 1987.
[8] Ibid., p. 177.
[9] Ibid., pp. 180-181.
[10] Jason Keith Fernandes, Citizenship in a Caste Polity: Religion, Language, and Belonging in Goa (Hyderabad: Orient Blackswan Pvt Ltd., 2020, p. 13. The book uses mobilisations around the Konkani language in Goa (in particular, the people’s struggle to secure for the Roman script equal status with the Devanagari script) to enter into a study of citizenship.
[11] Uday Bhembre, Yadincho Kurponno (Goa: Konknni Bhasha Mandal, 2025), p. 206-207. For the entire report by Bhushan Bhave, see Appendix 4, pp. 179-207.
Dalgado and the Konkani-Marathi Controversy
In 1917, Monsignor Sebastião Rodolfo Dalgado (1855-1922), an internationally renowned linguist and professor of Sanskrit at the University of Lisbon, analysed the linguistic and grammatical characteristics of the Konkani language, demonstrating its identity as being distinct from Marathi, in a series of nine articles, entitled “Konkani is not a dialect of Marathi”, published in the Panjim daily Heraldo[1].
What were the events that led Mgr. Dalgado to write the series?
Mgr. Dalgado was deeply aware of the pioneering linguistic, lexicographic and literary work systematically put in by European missionaries, mainly in the Roman script, in sixteenth and seventeenth century Goa;[2] sadly, Konkani studies began to languish side by side with the waning of religious zeal in the eighteenth century, which included the Pombaline period. However, even before that, indifference had turned into official hostility. An edict issued in the year 1684, by Viceroy Francisco de Távora, and some other state and ecclesiastical orders, sacrificed Konkani at the altar of Portuguese, which hereafter became the official vehicle of communication. A few Goan Catholic families began to regard Portuguese as their mother tongue, while the Hindus sought refuge in Marathi, which they used for religious and cultural purposes.
Notwithstanding the relegation of Konkani to the background, there was never a doubt about its linguistic status until, on the academic front, a Scottish linguist and poet, John Leyden, working in British India, unwittingly upset the apple cart. In his essay on Indian languages, in 1807, he classified Konkani as a dialect of Marathi, specifying that “the jargon of Goa” differed considerably from pure Konkani. A decade later, Baptist missionary William Carey’s translation of the Bible at the Serampore Mission was a shot in the arm for Konkani. However, it is Leyden’s ideas that began to gain currency, supported by another British missionary linguist John Wilson; the latter eventually came into the Konkani fold and his pupil J. M. Mitchell kept the flag flying, but contemporaries like writer Richard Burton, orientalist Erskine Perry, judge R. X. Murphy, civil servant John Beames and Sanskrit scholar A. C. Burnell were racked with indecision.
In Goa, the exclusion of Konkani from the curriculum of the first state-owned schools set up in 1831 demoralised Konkani speakers a great deal. Thankfully, there appeared light at the end of the tunnel when, in 1858, Goa Secretary-General J. H. da Cunha Rivara published an Ensaio histórico da língua concani.[3] He was enthusiastically supported by novelist and parliamentarian Francisco Luís Gomes and researcher Miguel Vicente de Abreu. However, the restoration of Konkani’s pride was short-lived, for in 1869, at the behest of the official Marathi interpreter Suriagy Ananda Rao, the use of the language was banned by José Ferreira Pestana, the Governor notorious for dismantling the old city of Goa. There was no question of its use in academic circles, whereas Marathi ruled the roost even at the prestigious lycée in the capital city.
As though to further dismantle Konkani, in 1877, Bombay-based academic R. G. Bhandarkar termed it a dialect of Marathi.[4] By this time, the number of scholars favouring the dialect theory had slightly outnumbered those holding the language theory; but the tide began to change after Goan scholar José Gerson da Cunha’s convincing response, The Konkani Language and Literature, saw the light of day in the said metropolis, in 1881.[5] He was the first to systematise and coordinate the arguments of the language theory and ought to have drawn stout torchbearers to the cause; but alas, at least three supporters – the Mangalore-based Italian Jesuit Angelo Maffei, Bombay-based writer R. B. Gunjikar and Mangalorean jurist Jerome A. Saldanha – were somewhat conciliatory. A stronger blow was yet to come by way of G. A. Grierson’s Linguistic Survey of India, whose seventh volume dedicated to Marathi, worked on by Norwegian scholar Sten Konow, was published by the British Government in 1905.
By and large, British India scholarship had hitherto favoured Marathi, but Konkani’s defenders in Goa were determined to not take it lying down. In that very year, Goan mestizo poet Fernando Leal began a crusade for the “resurrection of Konkani”,[6] close on the heels of another, Thomaz Mourão Garcez Palha, who had also worked hard. Writer Eduardo Bruno de Souza[7] in Poona, and Cristóvão Pinto, writer and parliamentarian, in Goa, followed suit;[8] and the ayurvedic physician Ramachondra Panduronga Vaidia, alias Dadá Vaidia, spoke in Konkani at Portuguese India’s first Provincial Congress, held in April 1916. He had made his point but was shouted down by Marathi writer Xambá Suria Rao Sardesai, who followed it up with a two-part article entitled “Ressurreição do concani”[9], obviously hinting at Leal’s clarion call issued a decade earlier.
The stage was set for Sebastião Rodolfo Dalgado to intervene from distant Lisbon. The tireless Goan Catholic missionary was now on a new mission: to prove Konkani’s credentials as a language. He had published a Konkani-Portuguese dictionary in Bombay,[10] and a Portuguese-Konkani volume in Lisbon.[11] The university professor and Fellow of the Portuguese Academy of Sciences was an authority on the influence of Portuguese on Asian languages, but his thoughts kept returning to Konkani. Significantly, one of his last works was a Konkani Grammar, which until recently lay in manuscript form at Goa’s State Library.[12]
Dalgado’s authoritative voice in Heraldo (Figure 1) helped put to rest issues that were plaguing Konkani ever since Leyden’s ignorance of Konkani’s grammatical structure had led him to question its linguistic independence.[13] However, as José Pereira points out in his Konkani: A Language,[14] “because of its language and limited circulation”, his nine-part series “remained unread by the majority of those who could have profited by it.”[15] Today, its translation into English (see Document in this issue) hopes to right that historical wrong and pay homage to that rare scholar whose centenary was observed last year.
Bibliography
da Costa, Aleixo. Dicionário de Literatura Goesa. 4 volumes. Macau/Goa: Fundação Oriente/Broadway, [1997-2005]
Dalgado, [Sebastião] Rodolfo. “O concani não é dialecto do marata”, in Heraldo (Pangim, Goa), Nos. 2570 to 2576, dated 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 and 22 February 1917.
Gomes, Olivinho. Konkani Literature in Roman Script. A Brief History. Goa: Dalgado Konknni Akademi, 2010.
Mascarenhas, Constâncio. “Defesa da língua concani”, in Boletim do Instituto Menezes Bragança, Bastorá: Tipografia Rangel, 1966.
Pereira, José. Konkani Literature: A History of the Konkani-Marathi Controversy. Dharwar: Karnatak University, 1971
SarDessai, ManoharRai. A History of Konkani Literature (from 1500 to 1992). New Delhi: Sahitya Akademi, 2000.
Endnotes
[1] “O concani não é dialecto do marata”, in Heraldo, nos. 2570 to 2576, dated 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 and 22 February 1917.
[2] Among others, Henrique Henriques; Thomas Stephens; João de S. Matias; Gaspar de S. Miguel; Simão Álvares; Karel Prikryl; Diogo Ribeiro, António de Saldanha, Miguel de Almeida, Ignazio Arcamone and Diogo de Amaral.
[3] Nova Goa: Imprensa Nacional, 1858.
[4] Wilson Philological Lectures on Sanskrit and the Derived Languages. Bombay: 1914.
[5] Bombay: Government Central Press, 1881
[6] Cf. “Glossário Português Oriental”, in Heraldo, no. 1562, 24 May 1905. Parts 2 and 3 appeared on 25 May and 10 June 1905.
[7] Founder-editor of the first periodical in Konkani, Udenteche Sallok, published from Poona, 1889-1894, he also wrote a series of articles on Konkani, in O Heraldo.
[8] Cf. his articles in Heraldo, August-October 1916.
[9] Heraldo, nos. 2336, 2337, 28-29 April 1916.
[10] Diccionario komkani-portuguez filológico-etymologico. Bombay: 1893.
[11] Diccionario portuguez-komkani. Lisboa: Imprensa Nacional, 1905.
[12] Mousinho de Ataíde and Cristo de Menezes (co-translators and co-editors), Grammar of Konkani Language. Goa: Broadway Publishing House, 2022.
[13] Mgr. Dalgado’s legacy was kept alive by another scholar, Dr Mariano Saldanha, who was a professor of Sanskrit at the University of Lisbon (1929-46), and later, of Sanskrit and Konkani at the Escola Superior Colonial (1946-48). Unlike Dalgado, who favoured the writing of Konkani in the Devanagari script, Saldanha was a votary of Konkani in the Roman script and wrote extensively on the language particularly after the latter period.
[14] José Pereira, Konkani: A Language. Dharwar: Karnatak University, 1971.
[15] Ibid., p. 53
First published in Revista da Casa de Goa, Series II, Sep-Oct 2023, pp. 16-19
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