wo Narayans and there is internal trouble
there. One is Narayan Athavle, editor of the Marathi
daily Gomantak, and the other Rajan Narayan, editor of
O Herald an English daily from Panaji. They are
fighting each other claiming that they are fighting for
two languages, Marathi and Konkani.

Their credentials can be questioned, though no one
bothers to do that. Athavle is an outsider: a
Maharashtrian Chitpawan Brahmin; Rajan Narayan is from
South India and is fighting for Konkani in English.

Athavle's editorials are pure petrol on Goa's red hot
embers. Starting with Ooth Marathe Ooth (Wake up
Marathas, wake up), Athavle, who supports Rane, has
carried on a relentless battle to show that Konkani is
a 'boli' (dialect) and not a 'bhasha' (language).
Athavle has published some 25 eminently forgettable
novels, and has had a lackluster career in Lok Satta,
the Marathi daily of the Express group.

Athavle gets quite alarmed when someone mentions
'Vishal Gomantak' (Greater Goa), which to him means
'expansionism'. But he has no qualms at all when he
says that Goa should finally merge with Maharashtra
because "their cultures are the same".

In his zeal to propagate the interest of Marathi, he
has even neglected the success of his newspaper which
has been falling in circulation. Tarun Bharat,
published from Belgaum in Karnataka, has taken away
6,000 out of the 18,000-odd Gomantak circulation. Yet
Athavle has such a strong grip over the owners, the
Chowgules, that he even overseas recruitment. No
Christians are employed in that daily.

Apart from editing O Heraldo, Rajan Narayan, a former
editor of Imprint, now speaks from political platforms.
Narayan has become more a pamphleteer than a
journalist. He often attends the strategy sessions of
the KPA. He has at times tried to maintain a balance
but has failed because he is viewed suspiciously by the
Hindus and because the Christians patronise him.

Rajan Narayan is a professional doing a job and taken
up with a cause which he would just as well drop like a
hot brick if he got a better challenge somewhere else.
However, the turn he has given to the O Herald has
taken its circulation to 12,000 from the 4,000-odd it
was selling before he took over its editorship. "I
don't make any pretensions that I'm being objective,"
says he. "I'm here to fight for Konkani."

Come what may, the two Narayans, both non-Goans, are
slugging it out through reams of newsprint. And both
are