Prutha Goa

The 9 th of February 2019 saw a flurry of joyous activity at  Nirmala Institute of Education. It was time again to celebrate that vibrant flower that is endemic to Goa, the abolim , or firecracker flower, with the Abolianchem Fest . The concept of using the flower as a symbol was integrated into  Nirmala Institute’s own Project Goa, which highlights Goa’s socio-cultural features with a variety of  typical Goan music, games, songs, dances, food, art, craft, etc that existed before 1975. The campus of Nirmala Institute of Education was alive with the abolim abounding in great clusters in one section. Missing in action was Goemcho Festakar Marius Fernandes, the man who suggested the use of the symbolic abolim and has in recent times been a great promoter of Goan culture. His absence was sorely felt. Project Goa was first developed on the basis of ex-English Methodology lecturer Ms Sharmila Veloso’s own English project. The goal of this project, which evolved into Project Goa, was to re

  In a time when we are struggling to recognise our roots as Goans and fighting to keep our identity from merging into a potpourri of cultures, we have some clarity in the form of the various cultural festivals that have been peppering the years since the beginning of the 2000s and will hopefully continue on through the years to come. We have one man to thank for this and that man is Marius Fernandes, now dubbed ‘ Goemcho Festamkar ’ for daring to leave a lucrative career behind and spend 17 years injecting goenkarponn into the goenkars (Goans) and their progeny. Marius was not born in Goa, but in Kenya in 1959, albeit arriving into a family that was firmly entrenched in Goan culture. Adventure seems to run in his veins since his grandfather Mathias Xavier Fernandes found himself in Kenya after spending the night on a dhow. He had been trying to escape the confines of strict convent education and had sought refuge in the dhow for a night’s rest only to find himself sailing to the con

Abolianchem Fest , dedicated to the abolim flower, was celebrated by Nirmala Institute of Education as the institute’s annual Project Goa celebrations to showcase the socio-cultural aspects of Goan culture before 1975. This included music, games, songs, dances, food, art, craft, etc that is authentically Goan, so as to document and preserve these positive attributes of Goan culture for the benefit of present and future generations of Goans. The festival saw the revival of interest in the abolim , or firecracker flower, also known by its scientific name of Crossandra infundibuliformis . Although it was named the state flower in the early part of the 1970s, there has been a decline in the presence of the flower in most parts of Goa. The abolim flower has been an integral part of religious and cultural rituals in Goa for years, and its resurgence has been spearheaded by the  Abolianchem Fest . Nirmala Institute of Education, where the Abolianchem Fest was held, has been Goa’s foremost s