LOCATED 23 kms north-west of Mapusa city and 13 kms from the Pernem town, the village of Paliem provides a serene evening view of the sun lurking behind the Terekhol Fort, while the birds chirp charming music amidst the verdant folliage. Once in the rugged hamlet, situated around 9 kms from the Siolim-Chopdem ferry in the Pernem taluka, one begins to feel the throb of the picturesque locality, perched gently at the edge of Goa’s northern-most boundary with Maharashtra.

If one ignores the petrol pump at Paliem’s entrance and the concrete bungalow of former minister and local MLA Sangeeta Parab, it doesn’t really take long to realise that one has reached the placid, distant backwaters of Goa. Here the lifestyle of the 4000-strong population, spread over seven wards, is totally uncluttered and unfettered by western trappings. They are quite literate by today’s standards and sufficiently aware of Goa politics. All that they lack badly is employment for the educated youth of the village. Otherwise, they have not hassles as far as transport is concerned, with a regular bus service from the Chopdem and Keri. A health centre caters to the healthcare of the rural populace.

Their small, tile-topped mud houses sport darker shades on walls than the subtle ones we generally see in the affluent villages elsewhere. Cowsheds are often attached to the house and the cattle tethered amidst hay and cowdung. Quite often one sees the knots of  villagers sitting around idly making small talk; the elderly menfolk generally gather at the teashop or at the spacious temple mandap, chatting with the smoking beedi clenched between the lips. Education is imparted by the Bhumika School, Ideal High School and the German-funded Bhumika Technical Institute to the village kids.

Paliem is overwhelmingly Hindu with various temples dotting the countryside. The Bhumika Vetal temple celebrates its Zatra in December, while the Mahalaxmi temple, built by the prosperous Sirsat community, observes its anniversary in May. The Mahadev and the Vateram Purush are the other temples in the village. There are merely four Catholics families in Paliem. All of them dwell near the chapel at Bandarwada, their parish church being at Arambol.

A heavy shower compelled us to halt at the mandap of the sufficiently spacious Bhumika temple, with impressive towers for a village so far away. That rainy evening when we pulled beside the temple, around 20 persons were sitting around in small batches in the mandap, discussing the strange moods of the monsoons, which affected their paddyfields, and probably of rising prices. Quite a few faces were screened by the translucent fume-film rising from the beedi, which kept them warm and stimulated.

In the dark recess of the hall, hung large drums, which they beat during the zatras and festivals. Strike the drum once and you will have the entire hamlet rushing there within moments, said the temple drummer, when we asked him to demonstrate how he beats it. Howver, he readily posed with it. It was definitely an irresistible scene for our camera, which had already disturbed the candid mood prevailing among the rustics. Distracted somewhat, they shifted their attention from the conversation they were engrossed in, to the camera, despite the fact that it was admiring them as unobtrusively as possible.

It wasn’t like they hadn’t seen a contraption like a camera earlier. They are used to cameras and photographers because tourists continuously drive past the place, in season, en route to the famed Terekhol fort. The more curious, camera-wielding tourists halt for a moment to soak in the quaint spectacle, and take home poignant pictures of the rugged lifestyle they witness at this distant point of Goa.

Being stirred a bit, they rose from their seats. Dusted the bottoms of their shorts and drew closer to us, wondering from where we had come. They spoke enthusiastically about their relatives in the places we hailed from, and soon began unwinding information about their own humble hamlet, which hasn’t witnessed really perceptible progress so far. But lack of progress hardly ever deters the spirit in the northern taluka of Pernem, where the friendly people love to debate and discuss volubly. And it wasn’t any different in forlorn-looking Paliem, whose more prosperous and popular neighbours are touristy Arambol and river-bedecked Keri.

There are hardly any large mansions and the biggest mansion in Paliem, belonging to the Ambiye family at Bavakhanwadda already lies in ruins. The family, however, has produced a wellknown saint, Soiru Bhai Ambiye, who is credited with the composition of several abhangs and gathas (religious songs). "You don’t have to look for great people in Paliem because you won’t find any." A villager puffed these words along with the beedi in his mouth. Paliem produces some of the best masons in Goa. Harischandra Vithal Sawal (70) even did the construction of the local temple in 1999. Of course, they talk of sculptor Sadashiv V Parab, who creates Ganesh idols for the Mapusa Police Station besides idols for other occasions. Ramnath Anant Naik, Shankar A Kadam and Chandrakant Parab are popular figures among the classical singers of Bhakti Sangeet (religious music). Narendra Naik and Dadu Parab pen lovely poetry while Rajesh Parab and Govind Bhat are noted as Marathi writers, they told us.

An interesting personality was wiry, 73-year-old Mahadeo Ramchandra Palienkar, who has bagged several prizes for playing the dholak, and has played all over the Konkan coast during Ganesh celebrations. In 1999, he was felicitated by the Kala Akademy at a Natya Samelan. He found him dressed in an impressive flame-coloured waistcoat.

Jairam Sirsat, who owns the massive Sirsat Building at the Mapusa taxi stand, and the former Speaker of the Goa Assembly and principal of DM College in Assagao, Surendra Sirsat, hail from Paliem as do all Sirsats. Among them also figures Jayant Sirsat, a wellknown businessmen in Mumbai, whose family contributed most for the construction of the temple. Ravindra Sirsat is a freedom fighter. They belong generally to vaishya or business community or goldsmiths and have spread all over Goa and even in Maharashtra. But all head home, nearly 2000 of them from Konkan, Kudal, Karnataka, Cochin, Mumbai and other places, in May for the celebrations of their Kuladevata Mahalaximi at the Deulwada.

Until the Sirsats came to know that Mahalaxmi was their family deity, they were mainly paying obeisance to Bhumika and Vetall. But when they came to know about Mahalaxmi, they converted the tiny shrine into a resplendent temple, which now figures on the tourist map of Goa.

Towards the end of the village lies the panoramic and historically important ward of Kiranpani. "It proved a transit point for people to escape the Portuguese rule and economic hardships by crossing over to Arounda, situated in Maharashtra on the other bank of the Terekhol river. They would row across the river, under the cloak of darkness, on rafts made by tying banana tree trunks with ropes," a chap waiting for the Kiranpani ferry informed us. People from Kiranpani sailed across to smuggle in foodstuff, particularly jaggery, potatoes and onions, during the economic blockade of Goa by India during the Portuguese rule. Freedom fighters and satyagrahis too used a similar mode of risky transport to infiltrate into Goa from Maharashtra.

The Liberation struggle of Goa unfolded an important saga in the village when freedom fighter Pannalal Yadav, from Uttar Pradesh, entered the village in 1953. He was mercilessly felled by the Portuguese soldiers while hoisting the Indian flag in the village heartland. Among the locals, freedom fighter Shanba Krishna Saji (almost 100 now) and his son Sadanand suffered a lot.

Such flashbacks of the turbulent past surface when the locals begin to unwind. We happened to be at Kiranpani (ray replete waters) while the sun was setting on a rainy evening. The scattered rays which escaped the grey clouds, presented an ethereal scene. Canoes casting long shadows in the glistening water, birds returning to their nests and the distant chimneys of the Usha Ishpat factory silhoutted against the last few rays lighting the dour evening, were the subtle shades which painted a memorable scene on nature’s unique canvas.

Kiranpani offers the easiest access to Maharashtra, with Vengurla 26 kms and Savantwadi 26 kms away from here. The distance from here to Belgaum is 110 kms and to Mumbai it is 510 kms. The flat-bottomed ferry begins chugging at 6.15 am and carries on every half-an-hour till the late hours of the evening, greatly facilitating the inter-state interaction between Goa and Maharashtra. Sit here for a while and you get the feel of the village rumour and news from either side of the river, while the passengers await the ferry.

The road dips sharply while going to Kiranpani. Several of the residential houses are about 34 metres below the level of the main road. Says a villager, "If anybody falls sick, the doctor has to descend 50 steps from the main road. Taking into consideration the remaining 50 steps to return to the road, the climb is sufficient to give a heart attack to any doctor. Hence they are unwilling to come to Kiranpani."

The place has been at the receiving end otherwise too. The Terekhol river, which casts its unusual charm on Paliem, faces an environmental threat due to the sand extraction carried out midstream with the help of canoes by migrant labour, who appear to be the beneficiaries of the economic activity, along with the local contractors.

Paliem in general does not boast of any perceptible prosperity. There is not a single bank as yet in the village. Majority of the households are tenants of the Deshprabhu landlords, who own over 50 per cent of the land in the village. The people live off the distillation of cashew liquor and sale of cashew nuts in summer. As far as agriculture is concerned, the major crops constitute rice and groundnuts.

However, until a few years ago, Paliem boasted of its handloom industry, which produced cloth items for various uses. Today, there are merely five houses persisting in the cottage industry, weaving bed sheets, towels, etc. Carrying on with the weaving activity now is uneconomic but what else can the unfortunate folk do in a plight like they are planted in?