Short of space - Goa law panel recommends common crematorium

With real estate prices shooting up and increasing incidents of inter-community bickering over disposal of the dead, the Goa Law Commission Thursday recommended setting up of a public crematorium-cum-cemetery on the lines of the Arlington national cemetery (ANC) in the US.

"Goa is increasingly seeing such tensions with rapidly shrinking land mass and people from all walks of life settling here. The state should step forward and ensure that the dead irrespective of caste, community, creed, religion find a place under the open sky in case they expire in Goa," commission Chairman Ramakant Khalap told reporters here.

Khalap said the commission had suo moto taken cognizance of the repeated conflicts between communities before suggesting the administrative remedy.

"We had one instance where high caste Hindus performed a cleansing ritual near Mapusa (in north Goa) after a lower caste Hindu was cremated there the previous night. There was a lot of tension in the area following the incident," Khalap said.

More recently, the south Goa town of Margao has seen increasing tensions between the Catholics and the Muslims with the latter claiming that the Christian-dominated village council were denying them permission to start their own burial place.

"Can you believe this is happening in this day and age in a cosmopolitan place like Goa? We need to bring an end to this. The law commission has recommended that the government acquire one large enough plot for north Goa and south Goa districts each and ensure that fighting over each other's dead stops," he said.

He said that present cremation and burial facilities could also continue.

"We could incorporate these tourism aspects here too, like the US government has done in such a wonderfully solemn manner. Does a burial ground or a crematorium have to be bleak and scary in appearance? Why can't someone be put to rest in scenic, yet serene surroundings?" he said.

The former union minister of state for law said that during a recent visit to the US, he was impressed by the concept of ANC which was founded in mid-1800s.

Regarded as one of the oldest cemeteries in the US, it has more than 300,000 people, mostly defence personnel, buried over 624 acres. Khalap said it was the calm, scenic surrounding and the tourism potential of the ANC that impressed him the most.

The Goa Law Commission was set up in January this year to review old laws and simplify legal processes in the state.

Last updated on Jul 16^th, 2009 at 18:52 pm IST--IANS