Comunidade

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The Comunidades of Goa are a variant of the system of "gaunkari" that was codified by the Portuguese. Members of the comunidades are called gaonkars, or zonnkars (Portuguese jonoeiros). The former are the members of the village, the latter are entitled to zonn, or jono, which is a dividend paid by the comunidade to gaunkars and accionistas, the holders of accao, or shares.

Over time, the old institutions have lost their original characteristics and therefore now mere societies of rights holders who are members by birth. The village development activities, once the preserve of the communidades / gaunkaris, are now entrusted to the gram panchayat, rendering the gaunkaris non-functional. The working of the comunidades is rigorously controlled by the state government leaving little scope for them to act as self-governing units. Their sole function at the moment is to parcel out their land at government-approved rates. The Tenancy Act, which extended the rights of the tenants of private landowners to those who rented their lands from the comunidade, for the payment of a foro, resulted in most field property of the comunidades passing into private hands.

At present most of comunidade land is in the hills, which is either uncultivated or given over to cashew plantations, which typically have usufructs. In the coastal parts of the state, almost all the land that once belonged to the comunidades has been usurped. Typically, no action has been taken by governments against such usurpation: the viewpoint is rather the contrary, see for instance, a report in The Times of India.

[edit] History

Communidade is The Portuguese term for Gavkari. The term gaunkari is a combination of two words, namely gaun (village) and kari (associations). ‘Gaunkar’ means the members of gaunkari who owned the land of villages collectively, managed its affairs collectively and shared the profits.

In some gaunkaris there are gaunkars belonging to both Hindus and Christians. Some have only Hindus or only Christians as members. Some have a mix of castes among Hindus and Christians while others have only members from one caste. It was believed that God was the head of the Gavkari(though there is no unanimous opinion about this) The lands were collectively cultivated and the produce distributed among villagers. Out of the total produce, a certain portion was earmarked for village welfare. The government’s share (taxes) in the produce was kept aside. The balance was distributed among the members which was called jana (individual profit). Each member got his share according to the percentage of shares he owned.

The Portuguese let the systems continue due to the nature of their structure and governance. But they made a few clever changes. They displaced the notion that God was the head of the Gavkari system, made themselves the head and increased the percentage of the harvest that went to them.