Team Herald
AQUEM: The by-election to ward 21 of Mragao municipality on Sunday was a hectic activity not for winning it but for the tall politicians to make a presence along the ward elections just ahead of the Assembly polls.
A joint campaign by Artur D’Silva, Bhai Naik and Sharmad Raiturkar for BJP supported candidate Sucorina Fernandes showed the unity between these political leaders and gave a clear indication that Sharmad may work for Bhai Naik this Assembly polls.
“Was a great turnout across the polling booths at St Joseph School, Aquem, Vidyanagar Government School. All the three booths showed an above 60% turnout right till the end at 5.30 am and that indicates a good result for us,” explained Sharmad Raiturkar who spent the whole day outside the election booth in Aquem.
Margao Development Front supported by the BJP was represented by Succorina Fernandes, while the shadow council that has been trying to woo people for an alternative government and recently met Arvind Kejriwal also had its candidate in Sonali Kale.
“Looks like the BJP strategy to have a Catholic face and fight a united poll may just tilt this election in their favour, but this election will have no bearing on the State assembly polls. Also, we continue to maintain our stand that this election is a referendum of this council’s new garbage fees and let’s wait for the outcome,” explained former MMC Chairperson and shadow council convener Savio Coutinho.
Meanwhile, Congress and Digambar Kamat backed candidate Deepa Shirodkar was embroiled in controversy on the poll day. Deepa, wife of former councillor Damu Shirodkar, and sister-in-law of MMC market inspector Anil Shirodkar got into a minor confrontation with the cops. Trouble broke out when Anil seemed to have misused his position as a government servant and entered the polling booth claiming to assist his wife but was influencing voters to vote for his sister-in-law Deepa. The police had to intervene and get him evicted out of the election polling area.
Re-elections to the ward necessitated following the drowning death of Ashlesha Ramesh Naik. Ashlesha drowned when she tried to save a Curchorem youth from drowning.
