States and union territories of India
India is a federal union comprising 29 states and 7 union territories, for a total of 36 entities. The states and union territories are further subdivided into districts and smaller administrative divisions; the Constitution of India distributes the sovereign executive and legislative powers exercisable with respect to the territory of any State between the Union and that State. The Indian subcontinent has been ruled by many different ethnic groups throughout its history, each instituting their own policies of administrative division in the region. During the British Raj, the original administrative structure was kept, India was divided into provinces that were directly governed by the British and princely states which were nominally controlled by a local prince or raja loyal to the British Empire, which held de facto sovereignty over the princely states. Between 1947 and 1950 the territories of the princely states were politically integrated into the Indian Union. Most were merged into existing provinces.
The new Constitution of India, which came into force on 26 January 1950, made India a sovereign democratic republic. The new republic was declared to be a "Union of States"; the constitution of 1950 distinguished between three main types of states: Part A states, which were the former governors' provinces of British India, were ruled by an elected governor and state legislature. The nine Part A states were Assam, Bombay, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal; the eight Part B states were former princely states or groups of princely states, governed by a rajpramukh, the ruler of a constituent state, an elected legislature. The rajpramukh was appointed by the President of India; the Part B states were Hyderabad and Kashmir, Madhya Bharat, Mysore and East Punjab States Union, Rajasthan and Travancore-Cochin. The ten Part C states included both the former chief commissioners' provinces and some princely states, each was governed by a chief commissioner appointed by the President of India.
The Part C states were Ajmer, Bilaspur, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur and Vindhya Pradesh. The only Part D state was the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which were administered by a lieutenant governor appointed by the central government; the Union Territory of Puducherry was created in 1954 comprising the previous French enclaves of Pondichéry, Karaikal and Mahé. Andhra State was created on 1 October 1953 from the Telugu-speaking northern districts of Madras State; the States Reorganisation Act of 1956 reorganised the states based on linguistic lines resulting in the creation of the new states. As a result of this act, Madras State retained its name with Kanyakumari district added to form Travancore-Cochin. Andhra Pradesh was created with the merger of Andhra State with the Telugu-speaking districts of Hyderabad State in 1956. Kerala was created with the merger of Malabar district and the Kasaragod taluk of South Canara districts of Madras State with Travancore-Cochin. Mysore State was re-organized with the addition of districts of Bellary and South Canara and the Kollegal taluk of Coimbatore district from the Madras State, the districts of Belgaum, North Canara and Dharwad from Bombay State, the Kannada-majority districts of Bidar and Gulbarga from Hyderabad State and the province of Coorg.
The Laccadive Islands which were divided between South Canara and Malabar districts of Madras State were united and organised into the union territory of Lakshadweep. Bombay State was enlarged by the addition of Saurashtra State and Kutch State, the Marathi-speaking districts of Nagpur Division of Madhya Pradesh and Marathwada region of Hyderabad State. Rajasthan and Punjab gained territories from Ajmer and Patiala and East Punjab States Union and certain territories of Bihar was transferred to West Bengal. Bombay State was split into the linguistic states of Gujarat and Maharashtra on 1 May 1960 by the Bombay Reorganisation Act. Nagaland was formed on 1 December 1963; the Punjab Reorganisation Act of 1966 resulted in the creation of Haryana on 1 November and the transfer of the northern districts of Punjab to Himachal Pradesh. The act designated Chandigarh as a union territory and the shared capital of Punjab and Haryana. Madras state was renamed Tamil Nadu in 1968. North-eastern states of Manipur and Tripura were formed on 21 January 1972.
Mysore State was renamed as Karnataka in 1973. On 16 May 1975, Sikkim became the 22nd state of the Indian Union and the state's monarchy was abolished. In 1987, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram became states on 20 February, followed by Goa on 30 May, while Goa's northern exclaves of Daman and Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli became separate union territories. In November 2000, three new states were created. Orissa was renamed as Odisha in 2011. Telangana was created on 2 June 2014 as ten former districts of north-western Andhra Pradesh. ^Note 1 Andhra Pradesh was divided into two states, Telangana and a residual Andhra Pradesh on 2 June 2014. Hyderabad, located within the borders of Telangana, is to serve as the capital for both states for a period of time not exceeding ten years; the Go
World Heritage Site
A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area, selected by the United Nations Educational and Cultural Organization as having cultural, scientific or other form of significance, is protected by international treaties. The sites are judged important to the collective interests of humanity. To be selected, a World Heritage Site must be an classified landmark, unique in some respect as a geographically and identifiable place having special cultural or physical significance, it may signify a remarkable accomplishment of humanity, serve as evidence of our intellectual history on the planet. The sites are intended for practical conservation for posterity, which otherwise would be subject to risk from human or animal trespassing, unmonitored/uncontrolled/unrestricted access, or threat from local administrative negligence. Sites are demarcated by UNESCO as protected zones; the list is maintained by the international World Heritage Program administered by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, composed of 21 "states parties" that are elected by their General Assembly.
The programme catalogues and conserves sites of outstanding cultural or natural importance to the common culture and heritage of humanity. Under certain conditions, listed sites can obtain funds from the World Heritage Fund; the program began with the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World's Cultural and Natural Heritage, adopted by the General Conference of UNESCO on 16 November 1972. Since 193 state parties have ratified the convention, making it one of the most recognized international agreements and the world's most popular cultural program; as of July 2018, a total of 1,092 World Heritage Sites exist across 167 countries. Italy, with 54 sites, has the most of any country, followed by China, France, Germany and Mexico. In 1954, the government of Egypt decided to build the new Aswan High Dam, whose resulting future reservoir would inundate a large stretch of the Nile valley containing cultural treasures of ancient Egypt and ancient Nubia. In 1959, the governments of Egypt and Sudan requested UNESCO to assist their countries to protect and rescue the endangered monuments and sites.
In 1960, the Director-General of UNESCO launched an appeal to the member states for an International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia. This appeal resulted in the excavation and recording of hundreds of sites, the recovery of thousands of objects, as well as the salvage and relocation to higher ground of a number of important temples, the most famous of which are the temple complexes of Abu Simbel and Philae; the campaign, which ended in 1980, was considered a success. As tokens of its gratitude to countries which contributed to the campaign's success, Egypt donated four temples: the Temple of Dendur was moved to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Temple of Debod was moved to the Parque del Oeste in Madrid, the Temple of Taffeh was moved to the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden in the Netherlands, the Temple of Ellesyia to Museo Egizio in Turin; the project cost $80 million, about $40 million of, collected from 50 countries. The project's success led to other safeguarding campaigns: saving Venice and its lagoon in Italy, the ruins of Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan, the Borobodur Temple Compounds in Indonesia.
UNESCO initiated, with the International Council on Monuments and Sites, a draft convention to protect the common cultural heritage of humanity. The United States initiated the idea of cultural conservation with nature conservation; the White House conference in 1965 called for a "World Heritage Trust" to preserve "the world's superb natural and scenic areas and historic sites for the present and the future of the entire world citizenry". The International Union for Conservation of Nature developed similar proposals in 1968, they were presented in 1972 to the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm. Under the World Heritage Committee, signatory countries are required to produce and submit periodic data reporting providing the World Heritage Committee with an overview of each participating nation's implementation of the World Heritage Convention and a "snapshot" of current conditions at World Heritage properties. A single text was agreed on by all parties, the "Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage" was adopted by the General Conference of UNESCO on 16 November 1972.
The Convention came into force on 17 December 1975. As of May 2017, it has been ratified by 193 states parties, including 189 UN member states plus the Cook Islands, the Holy See and the State of Palestine. Only four UN member states have not ratified the Convention: Liechtenstein, Nauru and Tuvalu. A country must first list its significant natural sites. A country may not nominate sites. Next, it can place sites selected from that list into a Nomination File; the Nomination File is evaluated by the International Council on Monuments and Sites and the World Conservation Union. These bodies make their recommendations to the World Heritage Committee; the Committee meets once per year to determine whether or not to inscribe each nominated property on the World Heritage List and sometimes defers or refers the decision to request more information from the country which nominated the site. There are ten selection criteria – a site must meet at least one of them to be included on the list
Temple
A temple is a structure reserved for religious or spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. It is used for such buildings belonging to all faiths where a more specific term such as church, mosque or synagogue is not used in English; these include Hinduism and Jainism among religions with many modern followers, as well as other ancient religions such as Ancient Egyptian religion. The form and function of temples is thus variable, though they are considered by believers to be in some sense the "house" of one or more deities. Offerings of some sort are made to the deity, other rituals enacted, a special group of clergy maintain, operate the temple; the degree to which the whole population of believers can access the building varies significantly. Temples have a main building and a larger precinct, which may contain many other buildings, or may be a dome shaped structure, much like an igloo; the word comes from Ancient Rome, where a templum constituted a sacred precinct as defined by a priest, or augur.
It has the same root as the word "template", a plan in preparation of the building, marked out on the ground by the augur. Templa became associated with the dwelling places of a god or gods. Despite the specific set of meanings associated with the word, it has now become used to describe a house of worship for any number of religions and is used for time periods prior to the Romans; the temple-building tradition of Mesopotamia derived from the cults of gods and deities in the Mesopotamian religion. It spanned several civilizations; the most common temple architecture of Mesopotamia is the structure of sun-baked bricks called a Ziggurat, having the form of a terraced step pyramid with a flat upper terrace where the shrine or temple stood. Ancient Egyptian temples were meant as places for the deities to reside on earth. Indeed, the term the Egyptians most used to describe the temple building, ḥwt-nṯr, means "mansion of a god". A god's presence in the temple linked the human and divine realms and allowed humans to interact with the god through ritual.
These rituals, it was believed, sustained the god and allowed it to continue to play its proper role in nature. They were therefore a key part of the maintenance of maat, the ideal order of nature and of human society in Egyptian belief. Maintaining maat was the entire purpose of Egyptian religion, thus it was the purpose of a temple as well. Ancient Egyptian temples were of economic significance to Egyptian society; the temples stored and redistributed grain and came to own large portions of the nation's arable land. In addition, many of these Egyptian temples utilized the Tripartite Floor Plan in order to draw visitors to the center room. Though today we call most Greek religious buildings "temples," the ancient Greeks would have referred to a temenos, or sacred precinct, its sacredness connected with a holy grove, was more important than the building itself, as it contained the open air altar on which the sacrifices were made. The building which housed the cult statue in its naos was a rather simple structure, but by the middle of the 6th century BCE had become elaborate.
Greek temple architecture had a profound influence on ancient architectural traditions. The rituals that located and sited Roman temples were performed by an augur through the observation of the flight of birds or other natural phenomenon. Roman temples faced east or toward the rising sun, but the specifics of the orientation are not known today. In ancient Rome only the native deities of Roman mythology had a templum; the Romans referred to a holy place of a pagan religion as fanum. Medieval Latin writers sometimes used the word templum reserved for temples of the ancient Roman religion. In some cases it is hard to determine whether a temple was an outdoor shrine. For temple buildings of the Vikings, the Old Norse term hof is used. A Zoroastrian temple may be called a Dar-e-mehr and a Atashkadeh. A fire temple in Zoroastrianism is the place of worship for Zoroastrians. Zoroastrians revere fire in any form, their temples contains an eternal flame, with Atash Behram as the highest grade of all, as it combines 16 different types of fire gathered in elaborate rituals.
In the Zoroastrian religion, together with clean water, are agents of ritual purity. Clean, white "ash for the purification ceremonies is regarded as the basis of ritual life," which, "are the rites proper to the tending of a domestic fire, for the temple fire is that of the hearth fire raised to a new solemnity". Hindu temples are known by many different names, varying on region and language, including Alayam, Mandira, Gudi, Koil, Kovil, Déul, Devasthana, Deva Mandiraya and Devalaya. A Hindu temple is the seat and dwelling of Hindu gods, it is a structure designed to bring human gods together according to Hindu faith. Inside its Garbhagriha innermost sanctum, a Hindu temple contains a Hindu god's image. Hindu temples are magnificent with a rich history. There is evidence of use of sacred ground as far back as the Bronze Age and during the Indus Valley Civilization. Outside of the Indian subcontinent (India
Goa
Goa is a state on the south-western coast of India within the coastal region known as the Konkan, separated from the Deccan highlands of the state of Karnataka by the Western Ghats. It is bounded by Maharashtra to the north and Karnataka to the east and south, with the Arabian Sea forming its western coast, it is the fourth-smallest by population. Goa has the highest GDP per capita among all Indian states, two and a half times that of the country, it was ranked the best-placed state by the Eleventh Finance Commission for its infrastructure and ranked on top for the best quality of life in India by the National Commission on Population based on the 12 Indicators. Panaji is the state's capital; the historic city of Margao still exhibits the cultural influence of the Portuguese, who first landed in the early 16th century as merchants and conquered it soon thereafter. Goa is a former Portuguese province. Goa is visited by large numbers of international and domestic tourists each year for its white sand beaches, places of worship and World Heritage-listed architecture.
It has rich flora and fauna, owing to its location on the Western Ghats range, a biodiversity hotspot. In ancient literature, Goa was known by many names, such as Gomanchala, Gopakapattam, Govapuri and Gomantak. Other historical names for Goa are Sindapur and Mahassapatam. Prehistory Rock art engravings found in Goa exhibit the earliest traces of human life in India. Goa, situated within the Shimoga-Goa Greenstone Belt in the Western Ghats, yields evidence for Acheulean occupation. Rock art engravings are present on laterite platforms and granite boulders in Usgalimal near the west flowing Kushavati river and in Kajur. In Kajur, the rock engravings of animals and other designs in granite have been associated with what is considered to be a megalithic stone circle with a round granite stone in the centre. Petroglyphs, stone-axe, choppers dating to 10,000 years ago have been found in various locations in Goa, including Kazur and the Mandovi-Zuari basin. Evidence of Palaeolithic life is visible at Dabolim, Shigao, Arli, Diwar, Sanguem and Aquem-Margaon.
Difficulty in carbon dating the laterite rock compounds poses a problem for determining the exact time period. Early Goan society underwent radical change when Indo-Aryan and Dravidian migrants amalgamated with the aboriginal locals, forming the base of early Goan culture. Early History In the 3rd century BC, Goa was part of the Maurya Empire, ruled by the Buddhist emperor, Ashoka of Magadha. Buddhist monks laid the foundation of Buddhism in Goa. Between the 2nd century BC and the 6th century AD, Goa was ruled by the Bhojas of Goa. Chutus of Karwar ruled some parts as feudatories of the Satavahanas of Kolhapur, Western Kshatrapas, the Abhiras of Western Maharashtra, Bhojas of the Yadav clans of Gujarat, the Konkan Mauryas as feudatories of the Kalachuris; the rule passed to the Chalukyas of Badami, who controlled it between 578 and 753, the Rashtrakutas of Malkhed from 753 to 963. From 765 to 1015, the Southern Silharas of Konkan ruled Goa as the feudatories of the Chalukyas and the Rashtrakutas.
Over the next few centuries, Goa was successively ruled by the Kadambas as the feudatories of the Chalukyas of Kalyani. They patronised Jainism in Goa. In 1312, Goa came under the governance of the Delhi Sultanate; the kingdom's grip on the region was weak, by 1370 it was forced to surrender it to Harihara I of the Vijayanagara empire. The Vijayanagara monarchs held on to the territory until 1469, when it was appropriated by the Bahmani sultans of Gulbarga. After that dynasty crumbled, the area fell into the hands of the Adil Shahis of Bijapur, who established as their auxiliary capital the city known under the Portuguese as Velha Goa. Portuguese period In 1510, the Portuguese defeated the ruling Bijapur sultan Yusuf Adil Shah with the help of a local ally, Timayya, they set up a permanent settlement in Velha Goa. This was the beginning of Portuguese rule in Goa that would last for four and a half centuries, until its annexation in 1961; the Goa Inquisition, a formal tribunal, was established in 1560, was abolished in 1812.
In 1843 the Portuguese moved the capital to Panaji from Velha Goa. By the mid-18th century, Portuguese Goa had expanded to most of the present-day state limits; the Portuguese lost other possessions in India until their borders stabilised and formed the Estado da Índia Portuguesa or State of Portuguese India, of which Goa was the largest territory. Contemporary period After India gained independence from the British in 1947, India requested that Portuguese territories on the Indian subcontinent be ceded to India. Portugal refused to negotiate on the sovereignty of its Indian enclaves. On 19 December 1961, the Indian Army invaded with Operation Vijay resulting in the annexation of Goa, of Daman and Diu islands into the Indian union. Goa, along with Diu, was organised as a centrally administered union territory of India. On 30 May 1987, the union territory was split, Goa was made India's twenty-fifth state, with Daman and Diu remaining a union territory. Goa encompasses an area of 3,702 km2, it lies between the latitudes 14°53′54″ N and 15°40′00″ N and longitudes 73°40′33″ E and 74°20′13″ E. Goa is a part of the coastal country known as the Konkan, an escarpment rising up to the Western Ghats
Dor Mhoineachi Rotti
Dor Mhoineachi Rotti is the oldest defunct periodical in the Konkani language. The magazine was named Dor Muineachi Rotti Povitra Jesucha Calzachem Devoçãõ Vaddounchi. Fr. Vincent Lobo, from Sangolda in Goa, curator at the St. Patrick's Church in Karachi, began it in 1915, to cater to the large number of Konkani-speaking people there, as there was no other Konkani spiritual literature, its stated intention is to spread the devotion to the Christian idea of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. On Fr. Vincent Lobo's death on 11 November 1922, Fr. António Ludovico Pereira from Sangolda, took over. Dor Mhoineachi Rotti had an estimated readership of around 12,000. After the death of Fr. António Ludovico Pereira on 26 July 1936, Fr. Antanasio Moniz, from Verna, took over. On his death in 1953, Fr. Elias D'Souza, from Bodiem, Tivim in Goa became the fourth editor. After moving to Velha Goa in Goa in 1964, Fr. Moreno de Souza was editor for around 42 years; the Dor Mhuineachi Rotti is owned by the Jesuits in Goa, edited by Fr.
Vasco printed and published by Fr. Kelvin Monteiro, S. J. on behalf of the Provincial Superior of the Jesuits in Goa. The magazine is published on a monthly basis
Portuguese conquest of Goa
The Portuguese conquest of Goa occurred when the governor of Portuguese India Afonso de Albuquerque captured the city in 1510. Goa was not among the cities Albuquerque had received orders to conquer: he had only been ordered by the Portuguese king to capture Hormuz and Malacca. On November 4, 1509, Afonso de Albuquerque succeeded Dom Francisco de Almeida as Governor of the Portuguese State of India, after the arrival in India of the Marshal of Portugal Dom Fernando Coutinho, sent by King Manuel to enforce the orderly succession of Albuquerque to office. Unlike Almeida, Albuquerque realized that the Portuguese could take a more active role breaking Muslim supremacy in the Indian Ocean trade by taking control of three strategic chokepoints – Aden and Malacca. Albuquerque understood the necessity of establishing a base of operations in lands directly controlled by the Portuguese crown and not just in territory granted by allied rulers such as Cochin and Cannanore. Shortly after a failed attack on Calicut in 1509, Albuquerque was replenishing his troops in Cochin and organizing an expedition with which to attack the Suez in the Red Sea, where the Mamluks were believed to be preparing a new fleet to send to India against the Portuguese.
The Portuguese Marshall Dom Fernando Coutinho had been killed in Calicut, fortuitously leaving Albuquerque with full, uncontested command of Portuguese forces in India. The Portuguese force was composed of 23 ships, 1200 Portuguese soldiers, 400 Portuguese sailors, 220 Malabarese auxiliaries from Cochin and 3000 "combat slaves"; the expedition set sail for the Red Sea in late January 1510, in February 6th anchored by Canannore and in the 13th sighted Mount of Eli. By the Mount of Eli, Albuquerque summoned his captains to his flagship, the Flor de la Mar, where he revealed the objective of the expedition: He had orders from King Manuel I to subjugate Hormuz, but seeing as the Mamluks were assembling a fleet at the Suez, he considered diverting from the original course of action and destroy it before it was ready. Thereafter, the expedition resumed its course and anchored by the city of Honavar, where Albuquerque was approached by an acquaintance of the Portuguese: the powerful Malabarese privateer, Timoji.
Timoji claimed to Albuquerque that it would be dangerous to leave for the Red Sea, as within the nearby city of Goa the remnants of the Mamluk expedition destroyed in the Battle of Diu were regrouping and reffiting new ships, but the city was scarcely defended as Sultan of Bijapur Yusuf Adil Shah had died and his heir Ismail Adil Shah was young and inexperienced. Knowing of the discontent among the Hindus of Goa after falling to the Muslim rulers of Bijapur in 1496, Timoji proposed to Albuquerque his support in capturing the city. Timoji's timely proposition was not coincidental, as Albuquerque had received in Cochin envoys of Timoji requesting a rendezvous. Upon assembling with his captains, Albuquerque convinced them that it was crucial that they attack Goa. In February 16, the Portuguese armada sailed into the deep waters of the Mandovi river. Supported by 2000 men of Timoji, the Portuguese landed troops commanded by Dom António de Noronha and assaulted the fort of Pangim, defended by a Turkish mercenary Yusuf Gurgij and a force of 400 men.
Yusuf was wounded and retreated to the city and the Portuguese captured the fort along with several iron artillery pieces. At Pangim Albuquerque received envoys from the most important figures of Goa, proposed religious freedom and lower taxes should they accept Portuguese sovereignty. Thereafter they declared their full support towards the Portuguese and Albuquerque formally occupied Goa on February 17, 1510, with no resistance. Albuquerque reaffirmed that the city was not to be sacked and that the inhabitants were not to be harmed, under the penalty of death. In the city, the Portuguese found over 100 horses belonging to the ruler of Bijapur, 25 elephants and finished new ships, confirming Timoji's information about the enemy's preparations. For his assistance, he was nominated tanadar-mor of the Hindus of Goa; the Muslims on their part were allowed to live by their laws under their own Muslim magistrate, Coje Bequi. Expecting retaliation from the Sultan of Bijapur, Albuquerque began organizing the city's defences.
The city's walls were repaired, the moat was expanded and filled with water and storehouses for weapons and supplies were built. The ships were to be finished and pressed into Portuguese service, the five fording points into the island – Banastarim, Naroá, Agaçaim, Passo Seco and Daugim – were defended by Portuguese and Malabarese troops, supported by several artillery pieces. At the same time, Albuquerque sent friar Luiz do Salvador ahead of an embassy to the court of the neighbouring Hindu Vijayanagara Empire, hoping to secure an alliance against Bijapur. Unbeknownst to Albuquerque, the Adil Shah had just agreed on a truce with the Vijayanagara Empire, could divert many more troops into recapturing the city than expected. To that effect, he sent a Turkish general, Pulad Khan, with 40,000 troops, which included many experienced Persian and Turkic mercenaries, that defeated Timoja's troops on the mainland. Ismail Adil Shah set up his royal tent by the Benastarim ford, awaiting for the monsoon to trap the Portuguese before giving Pulad Khan the order to assault the island.
Albuquerque was informed of this plan through the Portuguese renegade João Machado, now a prestigious captain in the Adil Shah's service, though he remained Christian. He was sent to convince his fellow countrymen to flee. Trusting the strength of his defensive position, Albuquerque rejected Machado's propositions. Machado told Albuquerque that Ismail maintain
Churches and convents of Goa
Churches and convents of Old Goa is the name given by UNESCO to a set of religious monuments located in Goa Velha, in the state of Goa, which were declared a World Heritage Site in 1986. Goa was the capital of Portuguese India and Asia and an evangelization center from the sixteenth century; the justifications for the inclusion of religious monuments in Goa in the World Heritage List are: 1) the influence of the monuments in the dissemination of Western art forms – the Manueline styles and Baroque – throughout Asia where Catholic missions were established. The city of Old Goa was founded in the fifteenth century by the Sultanate of Muslim rulers of Bijapur as a port on the banks of the Mandovi river; the village was taken in 1510 by Afonso de Albuquerque, the first Portuguese Viceroy, with the help privateer Timoja, remaining continuously under Portuguese rule until the twentieth century. At its peak it was said to have been a city of over 200,000 inhabitants and was known by the title'Rome of the East' for its splendid and innumerable collection of Cathedrals and churches.
Jesuits, Franciscans missionaries and other religious orders settled in Goa since the sixteenth century, used it as a center for the spread of Catholicism in India. The settlers were tolerant to Hinduism and other religions, but from 1560 the spread of Catholicism was reinforced by the arrival of the Inquisition in Goa, much feared in its time; the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were the golden age of Goa, which ran a flourishing trade and came to have administrative privileges similar to those of Lisbon. In the first two centuries of the Portuguese presence most of the churches and monasteries were erected that still populate the city, earning the admiration of travelers who passed through Goa; these monuments reflect the cultural exchange and legacy of the Portuguese: while the architectural forms follow the European canon, the internal decoration of altars, altarpieces and furniture reflect the labour, the work of local artists. This was made possible by the great tradition of Indian artists and sculptors of the Goa region, which made it not necessary to import large-scale labor-artistic work, but as occurred in colonial Brazil.
From the late seventeenth century, trade competition with Dutch and British led to the economic decline of Old Goa. Several epidemics ravaged the city and the river Mandovi became inadequate for the more modern ships; the Viceroy moved to Panjim in 1759, Old Goa lost the capital status in 1843. In the twentieth century, after several years of hostilities and diplomatic negotiations, Indian troops invaded and annexed Goa ending centuries of the Portuguese presence. However, the cultural influence continues to this day and it is evident in religious monuments in Goa, declared a world heritage site by UNESCO in 1986; the Church of Our Lady of the Rosary, built in 1543, is the oldest of the Old Goa churches still standing. It was a parish church collegial. On the outside, the church looks like a small fortress. Inside, it highlights the Manueline vaults of the chapels. In the chancel, besides the altarpiece dedicated to Our Lady of the Rosary, there on the wall a carved alabaster cenotaph in Persian or Indian style, with the inscription: "Aqui jaz Dona Catarina, mulher de Garcia de Sa, a qual pede a quem isto ler que peça misericórida a Deus para sua alma" The floor below is the grave of Garcia de Sá, João de Castro's successor as Governor of India.
Goa was elevated to the seat of a bishopric in 1534 by Pope Paul III, a towering cathedral church dedicated to Catherine of Alexandria was built in the first decades of colonization. This small church, insufficient to meet the faithful, was rebuilt from 1562, during the administration of Viceroy Dom Francisco Coutinho; the construction was slow, since in 1619 only the body of the church was complete, with the missing facade completed in 1631. The See of Goa is the largest building built by the Portuguese in Asia, 91 meters long and wide, which contributed to the slow pace of works; the church has three naves of equal height, shaped hall-church, as do other Portuguese cathedrals of time as the Sees of Miranda do Douro and Portalegre. The severe façade with three portals, has one tower: the right was destroyed during a storm in 1766; the church naves are separated by two rows of pillars. Interior decoration stands out the magnificent altarpiece of the chancel in gilt; the Society of Jesus arrived in Goa in 1542, its most important figure in these early days was the Francisco Xavier, considered the Apostle of the East for his work in the evangelization of Asia.
Some time after their arrival, the Jesuits created a religious education center, the College of St Paul or São Roque College, which had a huge library and press, but this complex was destroyed in 1830. The great Jesuit monument that survived is the Basilica of Bom Jesus, begun in 1594 and consecrated in 1605, for which worked the Goan engineer Julius Simon and the Jesuit Portuguese Domingos Fernandes. Following the model of Portuguese Jesuit churches like the Church of the Holy Spirit of
India
Velha Goa
