The worst piece of news I read recently was the planned “burial of 31 unidentified victims and 158 body parts” in Kerala’s Wayanad district. These are fatalities from the landslides, which have already claimed more than 385 lives, with 180 still missing. Imagine the fury of a disaster that leaves behind a jigsaw puzzle of human remains too complex to piece together.
We’re just about halfway through 2024, and the deadly landslides are already the seventh natural disaster India has faced this year. The tragedy has cast a long shadow over Goa, where Chief Minister Pramod Sawant described the Wayanad disaster as “an eye-opener for Goa” in the state Assembly, instructing departments ‘not to touch’ ecologically sensitive areas.
Meanwhile, Revenue Minister Atanasio Monserrate claimed that “no development is…permitted in ecologically sensitive areas such as hilly regions having slopes more than 25%, low-lying paddy fields, khazan lands, forest lands, mangroves, etc.”
We’ll see where these promises land in the coming years, but if history is any guide, these are the empty vaporings of a government on the back foot in the aftermath of a serious disaster. When it comes to the clash between ecology and “development”, the administration’s track record speaks volumes – and nature always seems to be on the losing side of this rigged game.
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Khazans in line of fire
CM Sawant’s remarks prompted environmentalist Claude Alvares, director of the Goa Foundation, to point out that Goa’s Town and Country Planning Department – recently in the news for assuming all-pervasive powers – had already approved 45 applications for converting nearly 8 lakh square metre of hill slopes to settlement. “How demarcation of a hill slope – which is based on Survey of India topo sheets – can be considered an “error” is simply beyond the imagination of the public,” Alvares said in the press note.
While civil society organisations grapple with the state’s creative interpretation of topography, an even more insidious threat lurks in the lowlands. It isn’t just Goa’s hills, forests, or beaches that are endangered; the state’s khazan lands, or coastal wetlands, which are considered a fine example of ancient eco-engineering, are also in the line of fire. These lowlands, reclaimed from Goa’s rivers and seas, represent human ingenuity completely in sync with the ebbs and flows of nature. At its simplest, a khazan is a system of flood control and land use that supports agriculture and pisciculture. An outer embankment guards against tidal flows, while a wooden sluice gate regulates water levels, and a natural depression or ‘poim’ serves as a reservoir for excess water.
This intricate system enables farmers to cultivate salt-resistant paddy during the monsoon and vegetables in the drier months, while fish thrive in the regulated waters. More than mere farmland, khazans are biodiversity hotspots, offering sanctuary to all manner of flora and fauna, including otters and crocodiles that are worshipped in some parts of Goa. The system also keeps saltwater away from villages, protecting groundwater from becoming saline.
I moved next door to a khazan three years ago, but it wasn’t until a guided walk with riverine ecologist Rhea Lopez last year that I really understood how all the tracts of land worked in tandem. A tarred road now cuts through this system, bisecting what would have been a seamless waterway into the river on one side and a creek on the other. During three weeks in July, when the monsoon is at its angriest, the creek and the bloated river meet in the middle, flooding the road. On a morning walk, a passing jogger had once shrugged and told me, “Water will find its way.”
Water found its way in Wayanad, taking vast tracts of land with it—and water will continue to find its way in Goa too. The one thing that stands between Goa and the threats posed by climate change is the “living heritage” and flood control mechanisms of khazan lands.
Also read: Wayanad paying the price because Kerala ignored Gadgil report. Landslide is wake-up call
The state’s lawlessness
While Goan administrators boast about their supposed commitment to “no development” on khazan lands, the reality is far messier. These ancient ecosystems face a barrage of threats that go well beyond simplistic notions. The truth is, khazans are caught in a perfect storm of neglect, mismanagement, and conflicting interests. As journalist Gerard de Souza pointed out, several khazans have been abandoned for farming in recent years due to breached embankments that have fallen into disrepair.
“All the fields in my village, Revora, would once be cultivated. Now they are all abandoned,” he told me. Several khazans are also being converted to fish and prawn farms, which require saltwater—leading to conflicts with those who want to continue agriculture.
The most tragic aspect is that environmentalists had predicted a Wayanad-like situation for years. They have been sounding alarms about the destruction of the Western Ghats like a chorus of Cassandras. This included Indian ecologist and academic Madhav Gadgil who headed the Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel. The committee’s findings were criticised for being “too environmentally friendly”. Gadgil says in a documentary on the Western Ghats, “We are a lawless society, supported by the state’s lawlessness… Where environmental impact assessment reports that are completely fabricated are accepted.”
Nowhere is the state’s lawlessness more crudely displayed than in Goa, where the state’s disregard for its own laws is wrapped in the shiny paper of development. Elsa Fernandes, the founding president of the Khazan Society of Goa, told me about a peculiar case they are fighting at the High Court of Bombay in Goa, alongside multiple petitioners. A panchayat building is due to be constructed on a khazan in Santa Cruz village, bordering Panaji. “We are in a situation where the central and state governments are making these laws and the same government is breaking them,” Fernandes told me.
These civil society organisations are also dealing with the aftermath of other government projects, where construction debris from Panaji’s Smart City undertakings is dumped in khazans surrounding the area. Panaji itself, which is built on what used to be a khazan, is under threat of inundation by 2040—yet new buildings with pile foundations continue to rise. “Do we know that khazan soil’s load-bearing capacity is almost zero? It’s like having a floating building,” Fernandes said.
She should know. Fernandes is an authority on Goa’s khazans: not only has she widely researched this ecosystem, but she also calls herself a “product of the khazan” because both her parents are khazan farmers.
I asked her to imagine what Goa stands to lose if it loses its khazan lands. Almost 90 per cent of coastal talukas would be inundated, and we’d lose our land resource, she said. Whatever land is not inundated would be even more vulnerable to coastal hazards. With saline waters taking over the land, our food and freshwater security would both be threatened. All of our biodiversity would be facing extinction. “I am unable to picture Goa sustaining itself without khazans,” she said.
The tragedy in Wayanad is a grim harbinger of what awaits Goa if it continues to neglect its khazan lands. In our misguided march toward “progress”, Goa stands to lose not just its khazans but also its final lifeline in the face of climate change. The choice—between preserving these living ecosystems or paving the path for our own destruction—has never been clearer.
This article is part of the Goa Life series, which explores the new and the old of Goan culture.
Karanjeet Kaur is a journalist, former editor of Arré, and a partner at TWO Design. She tweets @Kaju_Katri. Views are personal.
(Edited by Aamaan Alam Khan)