To all ends and purposes, Goa is in a political pickle or getting stirred up in a witches’ cauldron, a pungent name for our favorite dish, Sorpotel. Perhaps, some may say the State is sitting on a time-bomb and may or may not explode. At the time of writing, it’s clear as daylight that the top brass of the BJP and the local satraps of the party are unable to find an amicable solution to the issue as to who should carry Manohar Parrikar’s baton.
It’s a tragedy that Parrikar is laid low by cancer. But the greater tragedy is the behaviour of the cancerous leaders of the Goa branch of the party who act like hungry hyenas. In fact, I would call the drama unfolding before the people a tragi-comedy that one often sees in tiatrs. One doesn’t know whether to cry or laugh at the going-ons in the corridors of power. It seems the circus has come to town.
No doubt, Amit Shah is indeed the “shah” and has the authority of a kingmaker. He may be performing the role duly assigned to him but for those outside the circus tent, Amit Shah seems nothing more than a joker in the pack. Wasn’t he the person who masterminded the coup that brought the forces together with Parrikar as the glue in defrauding the Congress of its legitimate right to form the government?
Now that the glue has come unstuck for some ill-fated reasons, the coalition partners are showing their true colors. Let me say, United They Fall. Not just getting the regional parties such as the MGP and the GFP into the long arms of the BJP, but also securing the support of some Independents, Parrikar played his hand well. Allied to this midnight raid was the shrewd scheming of two of the top Congressmen, VIshwajit Rane and Mauvin Godinho. When such a patchwork was made hastily without any thought given to the coalition partner’s ideology and embracing floor-crossers for their own personal ambitions or political salvation, the BJP was nothing but a party of one. It was Parrikar and Parrikar alone.
The knives are out. They could politically stab each other and kill the party for all times. The MGP and the GFP doesn’t command the influence across the State to seize the reins of power. For them, the BJP is a surrogate mother. They have to stick to the motherlode or they will float down the Mandovi into the vast ocean and be lost. If Sudin Dhavlikar is installed into the CM’s chair, Vijai Sardesai will lose sleep. This is the bane of coalition politics, but coalition politics has come to stay in not just India and its states but in many countries.
The travails of the governing party and its partners are likely to get worse before they get better. Going by the memes in the social media and the anger and fear expressed by apolitical Goans, it seems this political storm will do much damage to the image of Goa, far greater than the tropical storms and wildfires that cause natural damage in some Western nations. It’s a bigger political tsunami the state has faced so far, and the moral turmoil and the political angst of the people is much deeper and much stronger than felt during the Opinion Poll.
As much as the jumping of hoops by the three parties in the government, the Congress has also been doing its sideshow. The Opposition party, on the other hand, is “jumping out of loops”. That the BJP pulled the carpet from under the feet of the Congress has left the once monolith party in Goa chasing its own shadow, the Congress has persevered in its doggedness to upset its rival’s applecart (or should it be Alfonso-cart).
Years ago, in this column I had stated that Congress needs a rainmaker to shower the electorate with words of political wisdom in its efforts to snatch back the seat of government. Since then I haven’t seen anyone with the ability to be one. The party lacks genuine leadership.
With all his faults or maybe his guile, Parrikar strode the Goan political landscape as an exemplary leader. In politics, having Machiavellian qualities often pays. And Parrikar was a Prince in political context.
I had one chance to meet Parrikar and that too in a crowd of journalists at the NRI meet held in Goa some years ago. He held forth in his customary way and his eyes sparkled as he made point after point and replied to a few questions in his characteristic style. He seemingly looked a non-conformist. As he is virtually not a CM anymore, I can say that the party is paying dearly for his Princely role and his lack of desire to groom his successor or, at least, a second-rung of leaders. Considering all options, I feel Goa is left with Hobson’s Choice.
(Eugene Correia is a seasoned journalist who worked for the Free Press Journal, and The Hindu)
