Hartman de Souza talks about 'Eat and Dust: Mining and Greed in Goa'

Much of the conversation with Hartman de Souza is peppered with his low deep cackle, "He, he, he...", he laughs, revealing a mischievous sense of humour directed as much at himself as at the follies and foibles of the world, and especially his native Goanese. It's a laughter, one realises very soon, that masks a deep-seated anger and frustration.

De Souza's recently released book Eat and Dust: Mining and Greed in Goa is the fruit of that anger. It is no 'factual' journalistic account of the devastation wrought by iron ore mining – though de Souza was once a senior journalist, knows more about the subject than any other and writes the occasional newspaper article on the subject. No, Eat and Dust… reads like a dirge, a song of lament for what Goa once was, that reveals a deep personal anguish at the desecration of the once lush forests and springs, and the corruption of its cultural life and social fabric by the unfettered greed of the miners.

The struggle against mining in Goa is a very personal one for de Souza; his own family, sister Cheryl who owned a farm near a mine owned by Joaquin Alemao, the brother of a then minister in the state government, and his 80-year-old mother Dora, had been at the forefront of the anti-mining protests. In fact, the two had even spent a night in jail when Dora, seated in her wheelchair, had chained herself to the entrance of the mines to prevent the trucks from entering.

"My mum was crazy," says de Souza, who also works in theatre recalling an incident where she, him and his sister drew up a "price list" for the blessings that the church fathers. "She was angry when she got to know that the priest had demanded 50 paise – this was 1967-68 and it was quite a large sum then – to bless a bicycle that my father had gifted to a social worker," he says.

De Souza is angry with the church for "sitting on the fence" on the mining issue. But the worst of his ire is reserved for his native Goans, whose own factiousness has prevented them from coming together to prevent the devastation of their habitat. "Goa is insular, small, communal, bigoted," he says, adding, "We Goans are very good at criticising, at saying that this must happen or that must happen, but we don't know how to work together and don't have a sense of commitment to the cause."

For a while, says Hartman, it got too much to bear. "We'd go to a party and the conversation would be about football, but I would bring it back to mining – my wife would laugh. It had become an obsession." And so he left, pursuing interests in theatre, jazz and education. Hartman set up the Space Theatre Ensemble in 2008 and now tours schools and colleges across the country with his four-member, all-girl troupe with its repertory of short plays on the environment, women's empowerment, etc.

When he goes back to Goa now, de Souza says his favourite places are the small bars in villages all over the state. It's where he draws his lessons in what he calls "cultural studies." "I take all my friends to the bars. The guys there, many of them older than me, all know me. They tell me stories about what Goa was. We discuss mining, politics, NGOs. In the end, we all weep."

In the final analysis, de Souza feels that the problem with Goa was precipitated by post-1990s economic liberalisation. "Everyone complains about the Licence Raj – it was the Licence Raj that prevented all these crony capitalists from coming into being," he says, adding, "I think we were quite happy with just the Premier car and the Ambassador. We didn't have the problems we are having now."

It's an idealistic position, more suited to college students, perhaps, than to someone whose hair is more grey than black. And it is the former, hopes Hartman, who will read his book. "My book is written for every Indian under the age of 30 who sees more value in the trees, the forests, the water than the ore underneath. Not all of them read Chetan Bhagat," he says, somewhat idealistically. It is for this young constituency that he once began running a tour called "MTV" for Mining, Transport and Venom along the devastated springs and forests of Goa. "They are as out of tune with the times as I am," he laughs.