Elections to the post of chairperson of municipal councils are not going well for the Bharatiya Janata Party. The cracks in the party are showing and also widening. The latest such election to expose the BJP strength was the election of the chairperson of the Ponda Municipal Council, where the BJP-backed candidate, Ritesh Naik, who joined the party recently and is also son of Congress MLA Ravi Naik, was edged out by Shantaram Colvekar, also a BJP member, and until May 18 the party’s Ponda mandal chief. Colvekar won the PMC chairperson post with the support of Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party and Goa Forward Party backed councillors and hours later was dropped by BJP as its Mandal president.
Last month, there had been high drama in Curchorem after the newly-elected councillors of the Curchorem-Cacora Municipal Council voted for a new president and within minutes of this gave notice of no-confidence against the very person they had elected. The chairperson had been elected by eight votes to seven, while nine councillors signed the notice of no-confidence, a clear indication that at least two councillors who voted for the new chairperson signed the notice of no-confidence against him. In the subsequent election, the councillor backed by the local BJP MLA Nilesh Cabral was elected to head the body. In Sanquelim, after the by-election in a ward, the post of the chairperson has gone to the opposition-backed panel. The opposition group had in a vote of no confidence ousted the BJP-backed chairperson after gaining the upper hand in the council.
The Ponda chairperson election is a big setback not just to the Bharatiya Janata Party but also to Ponda MLA Ravi Naik, who though being on the other side in the opposition, had a lot at stake in having his son elected as chairperson of the council. In a State where the political baton has often been passed from father to son, Ravi’s sons – Roy and Ritesh – have made various attempts to step into the big league of the political ring but have been unsuccessful. If Ravi, a former chief minister, hoped that their political fortunes would change with their entry into the BJP, then at least one of them has tripped at the very first hurdle.
For the Bharatiya Janata Party this comes as a double embarrassment as the party had control of the council but its councillor resigned with the intention that Ritesh would get the post. That has now not happened which comes as a major jolt to the party that had to also face rebellion by their mandal president, who the party has now divested of the post hours after he was elected the PMC chairperson. What is interesting in this council is that Colvekar is the fourth chairperson since the council was elected in May 2018. It had been the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party backed panel that had emerged victorious and the first chairperson had been of that party. Subsequently Bharatiya Janata Party managed to get its party man in the post in August 2019 and replaced him a year later. The decision to replace the chairperson yet again has proved very costly to the party.
With elections to the State Legislative Assembly now due in 10 months or less, these setbacks for the party in power will change a lot of equations. Coming up next week are elections to the posts of chairpersons of Margao, Mormugao and Mapusa that were postponed due to some of councillors-elect having tested positive for COVID-19. These are crucial towns and while Mormugao is in the bag for Bharatiya Janata Party, Margao is out of their hands. It is the Mapusa election that will prove to be an interesting battle as Independents hold the key here after the party-backed panels won an equal number of seats. The political winds could just be changing.
