While appointing or naming an officiating Chief Minister for a short period of less than a week is actually a non issue, it is still interesting to dwell on the issue from a political perspective. There is, and not surprisingly, a curious interest in knowing who really is Parrikar’s number two.
In terms of the protocol of swearing in, which determines the order of the ministers it is Sudin Dhavalikar, Vijai Sardesai and then Francis D’Souza. D’Souza, a former Deputy CM, again a post of convention and not constitution, had to be lowered in order to accommodate the two allies MGP and Goa Forward.
In the earlier term, there was no cause for ambiguity. Francis D’Souza assumed charged in the Chief Minister’s absence, but here it must be said that the entire arrangement is extremely fluid and flexible and the practice of formally naming who the Chief Minister in charge, will be, is not practiced anymore.
Historically, and this is true of commonwealth countries, he position of acting prime minister was accorded when the Prime Minister was travelling overseas, on vacation, or in ill health. In the early 20th century, when travel by ship was still the norm, there used to be Acting Prime Ministers of nations for months on end.
Those times have changed. Prime Minister Modi, during his travels abroad, has not named an acting PM though he has senior ministers Rajnath Singh and Sushma Swaraj.
Also with trips less than a week and satellite communication so advanced, the idea of an “acting” head is really past its sell by date.
As far as Mr Parrikar’s trip to the US is concerned, it is also very likely that he didn’t want to, even if for the sake of tokenism-leave the state in charge of an ally party.
In the four month old government, the BJP and its allies are still finding their feet. Some rough edges are being smoothened out. There is an impression that the allies have been dictating the government’s moves. Therefore the Chief Minister probably did not even want to give any more talking points during his absence.
Having said that, the critical need is to have more effective work distribution among ministers. The CM still has far too many portfolios and he can easily be lighter by 15 odd departments. How he allocates these portfolios among existing ministers is going to be closely watched. At this point of time the Chief Minister is forced to look at every macro decision making and supervision.
This is partly due to habit and mostly due to the fact that his knowledge of governance is more than the combined weight of ministers. Unless he pulls back and bit and focuses on the larger issue of implementing the Common Minimum Programme or look at the broad picture of revenue, jobs and investment, the pressure to tighten nuts and bolts will take him away from building the right castles for Goa’s development.
The current functioning does have a silver lining with the cloud visible too. Most of the pro active ministers like IT, TCP, WRD, Art and Culture are from the allies. The health and panchayat ministers, though from the BJP, are Congress turncoats.
While this may ensure robust governance, the BJP part of the coalition needs to radiate more in governance. Right now it’s all about Mr Parrikar, whether he is in India or in the US.
