Team Herald
MAPUSA: Patrick Savio Almeida and Pramita Govekar have been elected unopposed as Sarpanch and Deputy Sarpanch of Anjuna Caisua Panchayat on Monday.
After delaying the election for these posts for ten days, it was held on Monday in the presence of presiding officer Fotusingh Shetgaokar who declared Patrick and Pratima as Sarpanch and Dy Sarpanch of Anjuna Caisua. At the election only seven of the eleven elected panchas present.
While promising development in Anjuna Caisua village in the next five years, Patrick said politics would not be tolerated. Making the village garbage free would be his first priority along with development of all grounds and a proposal for a children’s park in the village.
Savio added that keeping the team together for the last 10 days was not difficult since all the seven members were like-minded and intended to develop the village.
The post of Sarpanch will be shared between the panchas.
Initially, the election of sarpanch and deputy sarpanch was scheduled on July 8. However, it was adjourned since the presiding officer Krishna Gadekar was absent. The officer was later replaced by Sandesh Naik, who reached 20 minutes late for the meeting and subsequently refused to conduct the election and adjourned the meeting.
However on July 9, the seven panchas wrote to the Director of Panchayats giving him 24 hours time to fix the election. But, since the Director failed to fix the election date, they moved the High Court on Tuesday and filed a writ petition, urging that the Director of Panchayats be directed to fix a date for the first meeting of the elected members immediately for electing the sarpanch and deputy sarpanch. Responding to the petition, the Director of Panchayats fixed the election on July 17, following this, the High Court disposed of the petition on Wednesday.
