Games politicians play
Mr Vishnu Wagh’s decision to openly dare his party to sack him after he joined the Goa Rakhan Manch’s dharna on the medium of instruction (MOI) on Saturday has nothing to do with principles and everything to do with politics. No doubt Mr Wagh is a strong and forceful supporter of Marathi and the regional languages. But the BJP MLA is also extremely upset with Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar, and with good reason. The Goa police has done little to track down the people that attempted to physically assault him in Tivim a couple of months ago which might have exposed the hand of the RSS and other BJP affiliates and their henchmen who are suspected to have been behind the bid to intimidate the Santo Andre MLA.
The chief minister’s lukewarm reaction to the attack on someone from his own party, and a member of the state’s legislative assembly at that, has no doubt proved to be the last straw in a relationship that was already headed for splitsville. Mr Wagh is certainly no pushover. Nor is he a member of the “disciplined” saffron cadres who could be easily tamed into submission. Note how MP Shripad Naik and the BJP’s South Goa candidate Narendra Sawaikar—both staunchly RSS and both Marathi supporters—have quietly accepted Mr Parrikar’s decision on the MOI as final. But there is also the risk that Vishnu Wagh might be overplaying his political hand and could end up burning all his bridges.
By Monday came the news that the chief minister had decided to strip the defiant MLA from the chairmanship of the Kala Academy and his second-in-command post at the Entertainment Society of Goa. The decision is unlikely to tickle Mr Wagh who is now bent on inviting an expulsion from the BJP. Any such move would reduce the saffron party’s number to 20 MLAs in the Goa House from the current 21.
While this will in no way jeopardise Mr Parrikar’s government in the 40-member House given that the BJP has a pre-poll alliance with the MGP which has three MLAs, besides the support of two Independents and two Goa Vikas Party members, one never knows what typically Goan Machiavellian moves could be unleashed in a state where politicians are known to have a predilection for instability and chaos. Which is why Mr Parrikar is unlikely to indulge his defiant MLA, who has made no secret of the fact that he has been parleying with both the NCP and the Congress.
When has Vishnu Wagh not been hobnobbing with the BJP’s rivals, was Mr Parrikar’s cynical assessment of the somewhat ‘Congressesque’ situation. All things considered, Mr Wagh has painted himself into a political corner. A complete untouchable now within the party that gave him a ticket to contest the 2012 poll because the Congress wouldn’t since it already had a sitting MLA, Mr Wagh’s move “back” to the Congress or the NCP—whichever gets the North Goa seat, is inevitable.
While the first-time MLA has been able to use Saturday’s protest against the government’s MOI policy to score political points, the Goa Rakhan Manch and members of the Bharatiya Bhasha Suraksha Manch who were used by the BJP to embarrass the Congress on the very same issue before the election have been exposed for their duplicity. The BBMS claimed it had not been taken “into confidence” by the chief minister.
But the fact is that despite all the BJP-supported public protests against English for the benefit of the rolling cameras, Mr Parrikar has endorsed grants to English medium minority primary schools. Education after all, is driven by political considerations too.
