The Rationale: Everything is in flux in India’s smallest state. Goa is experiencing bewildering change, at a blistering pace. Powerful forces – both national and international – are exerting tremendous pressure on demographics, the fragile environment, hard-won social stability, and the many-layered cultural integrity that has evolved over centuries. It is clearly apparent that we are losing a great deal, very often before even recording or recognizing its value. We need to document, research, paint and photograph, study and analyze all aspects of Goa’s cultural ethos, at the most sophisticated level possible, so that present and future generations can understand who they are and what is at stake for them.

The Record: Although their emergence has been intermittent and irregular, every issue of Parmal: The Eternal Fragrance of Goan Heritage has immediately become prized by students, researchers, academics, writers, artists, musicians, and everyone interested in heritage, art and culture. They are collectors’ items, because Goa has no other first-rate and reliable repository for well-researched scholarly articles and artworks that look at the innumerable dimensions of the tiny state’s outsized cultural legacy and impact on India and the world. The need and demand for this publication has only grown over the years, and is starkly evident at this juncture.

The Gameplan: Under the guidance of an the editorial board of Heta Pandit, Rajiv D’Silva and Prajal Sakhardande, the veteran writer/photographer/curator Vivek Menezes will produce two editions of Parmal: The Eternal Fragrance of Goan Heritage in 2021, and three in 2022, following which the publication will aim to transition to bimonthly. This year, the themes for the two issues, successively, will be “Music” and “Nature”, and these topics will be addressed via an exciting, vibrant, and diverse set of texts and images ranging from academic essays to short fiction and poetry, plus exclusive paintings, illustrations and photography.

The Blueprint: While the editor and editorial board will work strictly pro bono, the other contributors to Parmal: The Eternal Fragrance of Goan Heritage will receive a respectful honorarium that affords sufficient dignity to their labours. It is expected that the total commissioning costs of each upcoming issue of the magazine (over the next five) will be 2.5 lakhs, plus another Rs. 50,000 set aside for dynamic design and layout, proofreading and other related services.

The Proposal: We seek the total of Rs. 6 lakhs to produce, print and distribute the next two editions of Parmal: The Eternal Fragrance of Goan Heritage in the course of the next ten months. The potential sponsor can place their own advertising or message on the last two interior pages of the magazine, and will be prominently cited and thanked at all related launches and public events.

GHAG enjoys Exemption U/S 80-G of the Income Tax Act, 1961 (80-G/CIT/PNJ/52-G/2008-9) and accepts donations by bank transactions in Indian rupees only.

Address for snail-mail correspondence or to pick up copies of the Panaji book or back issues of Parmal journal:
Maia Heritage House
1/98 Grande Morod, Saligao Bardez 403511