Panaji: Goa and Goans will remember the late Enio Pimenta’s contributions to the Opinion Poll and Goan society on his birth centenary on December 26. Born in 1923 in Curtorim, Pimenta passed away on March 24, 1994.
Having received his early education in Portuguese, Pimenta completed the 5th year at Lyceum. He later graduated in Arts and completed FY LLB from Bombay University (now Mumbai University). People in Goa recall Pimenta’s active role in Goa’s liberation movement.
Enio Pimenta Bio
His ‘Satyagraha’ on June 21, 1946, at Lohia Maidan in Margao, along with Purushottam Kakodkar and others, was memorable. His participation in the Quit India movement in Mumbai, along with his articles in the ‘Bharat Jyoti’ and ‘Free Press Journal’ publications of Bombay on Goa’s freedom struggle, ignited the flame of freedom in readers’ minds.
From 1948 onwards, Pimenta spent his life in Mumbai until the liberation of Goa. A warrant of arrest was issued against him in 1948 for having close links with the Indian Consulate at Panaji, compelling him to live in exile in Bombay until Goa was freed. Pimenta remained a member of the National Congress Committee, Bombay Branch, from 1949 to 1951. He edited a nationalist weekly, ‘Goemkar,’ which was circulated clandestinely in Goa. He was also a member of the Goa Advisory Committee of the Central Government from 1950-52.
Enio Pimenta's career in Bombay
Pimenta was associated with several institutions and social organizations in Mumbai, including the Catholic Association of Bombay, Konkan Cultural Association, Goan Institute, and Curtorim-Macasana-Guirdolim Union. Along with a few fellow Curtorkars, he founded St Xavier’s Institute, Curtorim, in 1953. He also worked as an English and French Teacher in St Sebastian Goan High School, Dabul, Bombay, and St Francis D’Assissi High School, Borivali, for a couple of years before joining Franco-Indian Pharmaceuticals, Bombay, as the publicity manager and assistant editor of the company’s journal ‘La Medicine en France,’ where he worked until March 1962.
After the liberation of Goa, he returned and plunged into active politics and social work. He was the joint editor of the Konkani daily ‘Sot’ in 1963. Pimenta was elected as a member of Goa’s First Legislative Assembly, representing Curtorim constituency on the United Goans Party ticket in December 1963. He was the secretary of the United Goans Legislature Party from 1963-1966.
He was a firebrand legislator with an immense contribution to the debates in Goa’s First Legislative Assembly. Pimenta played a stellar role in the historic Opinion Poll of 1967 as the Curtorim MLA and chairman of the South Goa Anti-Merger Front and in the movement for the recognition of Konkani and Statehood for Goa.
Pimenta was a founder member of Curtorim Educational & Welfare Foundation, which he served as president and as chairman of its Educational Board. He worked as a teacher in St Xavier’s Institute, Curtorim, for several years and was the founder chairman of Curtorim Service Co-operative Society formed in 1964. He was actively involved in the affairs of Comunidade of Curtorim as its attorney and president for several terms and also served Comunidade of Margao as its special attorney.
Pimenta was the charter president of the Lions Club of Curtorim and served as Deputy District Governor of Lions Clubs International District 324 D-2 comprising Lions Clubs in Goa and part of Karnataka. He was a linguist, conversant with English, Portuguese, French, Spanish, and Italian besides Konkani.
Pimenta was awarded the Tamrapatra by the Goa Government in 1994 in recognition of his notable contribution to Goa’s liberation movement. He was also instrumental in getting the Primary Health Centre set up in Curtorim. In recognition of his immense contribution, the main road starting from Ximbhat, Curtorim, up to the Macasana border is named ‘Enio Pimenta road.’ It is because of the active involvement of visionaries like Enio Pimenta that Goa and Goans are enjoying the fruits of liberation today.
