The Konkanis who settled in Goa engaged in creative literature and defined grammar for the language. Meanwhile, the Portuguese were land hungry and had started occupying the Indian west coast. They invaded the land of Parashuram and started harassing the Konkanis. These religious fanatics wanted to fill the entire universe with followers of Jesus Christ and forced their own language, customs, and religion on the residents. They even passed a law banning Konkani. In fact, they burned all the Konkani literature available at the time in 1548 A.D. The Konkanis became cultural orphans. The foreigners burnt alive the Konkanis who did not accept Christianity and forcefully converted the weaker sections of the society. They even changed their names to Christian names. So to preserve their identity the Konkanis had to migrate to different parts. This is the single most reason why Konkani has so many dialects; those who went to different parts of India were influenced by their local languages. In Vengulra, Sawantavadi, and Ratnagiri, they adopted Marathi, and Malavani was formed. In south and north Kanaras, Konkani language was influenced by Kannada, and in Kerala, the Malayalam words were integrated to the language.
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