23 Oct 2020  |   04:51am IST

Sawant’s ‘troubles’ with alliance partners continue

Sawant’s ‘troubles’ with alliance partners continue

On October 21, Independent MLA Prasad Gaonkar withdrew support to the Dr Pramod Sawant government. He submitted the letter of withdrawal of support to Governor Bhagat Singh Khoshyari. However, one fails to understand the logic behind the entire controversy that led to the withdrawal of support. Gaonkar, as MLA, was reflecting the opinion of his constituents when he said that his people were robbed of a prestigious project like the IIT Goa. Indeed, the then Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar had promised the IIT to Sanguem and as such three sites had been identified. However, after the proposal of land at Melauli for the IIT was made, Sanguem was dumped without offering any valid reason.

If one goes by the current state of development, Sanguem definitely needs a push with a big ticket project like the IIT as the entire area is underdeveloped with no business opportunities. The youth have to travel either to Ponda or Margao for employment. Hence, there was nothing wrong in Gaonkar expressing his opinion. What added fuel to the fire and kicked up the needless controversy was the counter statement of Sawant that Goankar was moving around doing deals. “The Sanguem MLA’s setting failed to realise,” the CM said. Now this statement is the undoing of any chief minister. The statement is okay for an opposition MLA or politician to make, but not for the person holding the constitutional post of a Chief Minister.

Besides, Sawant who has enough of problems to deal with, has invited another one in typical fashion. 

Sawant's statement was not of a true leader. He could have easily played down Gaonkar’s statement by saying he will look into the grievances of the people of Sanguem and perhaps will offer another project to the constituency and taluka to generate avenues of business and employment. Instead, by stating what he did he has hurt not only the MLA but also his supporters in Sanguem, who wanted the IIT Goa in the constituency. One has to also take into consideration that Gaonkar has stood by the Sawant government and earlier by the Manohar Parrikar government despite receiving a raw deal in the government and has been supporting them since 2017. He resigned last year as chairman of the Forest Development Corporation as a mark of dissent but continued to support government. 

At a time when the Opposition is getting united in opposing the government on every issue, Sawant does not need to make new foes. Sawant’s statement indicates that he has turned overconfident with 27 BJP MLAs in his camp. He knows he also enjoys the support of Independent MLA Govind Gaude and the informal support from NCP’s lone MLA Churchill Alemao. But, if one goes back to the time since he took over the Chief Minister’s position, his tenure has seen allies being dropped at irregular intervals. Be it the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party or the Goa Forward Party or Independent MLAs, Sawant has never been able to hold on to the alliance partners or perhaps he simply does not believe in alliance politics.

One wonders what would the CM’s statement have been if the BJP numbers in the House were 17? Would he dare to make such a statement? Also, one fails to understand what message the CM wanted to send with his statement. As rightly pointed out by Gaonkar, the CM could have called for an inquiry in the alleged land deals of IIT and not make unsubstantiated statements. Of course there was opposition in Sanguem to the IIT, however, the magnitude of protest appears to be much higher in Murmune, Guleli, wherein the people are protesting for over a month now. 


IDhar UDHAR

Idhar Udhar