Team Herald
PANJIM: Contrary to their own predictions, the ‘We Ponjekar’ panel couldn’t form the majority at the Corporation of the City of Panaji (CCP), winning only four seats. Overall, from 29 seats they contested in, they won a total of 6574 votes, which is 29% of the overall vote share.
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Besides these four, independent Surlikar Santosh Dhananjay of ward 23 was the only other candidate opposing the BJP panel to win. He defeated former corporator Shekhar Degvekar winning by a margin of 165 votes.
When counting of the CCP polls had just begun, the mood at the ‘We Ponjekar’, was an upbeat one, with their candidate Nelson Cabral, being declared the winner of ward number 1 with a lead margin of 65 votes.
By the time they had reached ward 9, ‘We Ponjekar’ were still hopeful as they had won four seats in total. The other three victories; were from ward 6 where Surendra Furtado, the former Mayor polled beats former corporator Kishore Sastry with a lead margin of 57 votes. His wife Ruth Furtado, who was a corporator in the last council, also caused an upset defeating former corporator Soraya Pinto Makhija by ten votes. In ward 8, youth Joel Andrade defeated former corporator Rahul Lotlikar with a lead margin of 63 votes. The fact that they had defeated three ex-corporators backed by BJP seemed like a big deal at that point of time.
However, their victories were restricted to just these four wards with BJP sweeping almost all of the remaining seats. The BJP-backed candidate Manisha Manerkar beats former corporator Rekha Kande (We Ponjekar) by a significant lead margin of 164 votes. Rohit Monserrate, son of Panjim BJP MLA Atanasio ‘Babush’ Monserrate won from ward 3 with a huge margin of 294 votes beating ‘We Ponjekar’ supported candidate Jose Martins.
It wasn’t a cakewalk in some wards though as the ‘We Ponjekar’ panel gave a tough fight to the BJP-backed candidates. For instance, in ward 25, ‘We Ponjekar’ candidate Vasudev Manekar lost by a margin of just one vote to the BJP candidate Sanjeev Naik.
It appeared that there were more votes in favour of the non-BJP backed candidates but due to a split of votes, the BJP candidate won. It was observed in ward 27 where Lorraine Dias, who was a corporator in the last council, polled 331 but won by a slender margin of 23 votes. Her opponents, Malisa Simoes (‘We Ponjekar’ panel) got 308 votes and Fernanda Colaco got 88 votes, which together combine to 396 votes.
It was witnessed also in ward 30, where BJP-candidate Sandra Da Cunha polled 461 votes, while the remaining five candidates, together polled 442 votes. It gave a clear indication of the overwhelming support to Babush in this ward. There were some ‘We Ponjekar’ candidates who suffered humiliating defeats like Alisha Chari from ward 18 getting only 37 votes and Sayyed Khadri from ward 23 getting only 21 votes.
Also six former CCP councillors from erstwhile municop[al councils, namely Krishna (Milind) Shirodkar), Ratnakar Fatarparkear , Bharati Heble, Suresh Chopdenkar, Vivina Nasnodkar and Naguesh Kariashetty who were trying to make a comeback lost the elections.
Reacting to the overall defeat, Valmiki Naik, said, “The voters of CCP have given their verdict. We at Ami (We) Pannjekars humbly accept the results, and congratulate the ruling panel for their victory. For democracy to thrive, a vibrant opposition is as important as the ruling dispensation. We thank the people of Panjim for entrusting us with this role, and we will ensure that CCP functions with utmost transparency and fairness. We will continue to fight for all Pannjekars, and look forward to ensuring that the ruling panel resolves the long-pending important issues of the city.”
Surendra Furtado added, “We fought a strong ruling panel with limited resources. Our candidates were being threatened to withdraw. Our supporters were being threatened for campaigning with our candidates. False complaint was filed against me and my election agent. The entire government machinery was used against us. However we (We Ponjekar) managed to get 4 seats. 3 seats from Miramar and Tonca are won by me despite delimitation and reservation.”
Another former corporator Rupesh Halankar who contested as an Independent candidate from ward 29 lost, as did the two other Independent candidates he was supporting from other two Ribandar wards.
Halankar lost to BJP-backed Slyvestre Fernandes by a margin of 28 votes in the ward that had a total of 5 candidates contesting.
