MARGAO: The Congress said its candidate for South Goa Parliamentary constituency Francisco Sardinha would file his nomination papers on April 2, at 9.45 am.
Sardinha held a meeting with Seva Dal members as part of his campaign at the party office.
There was a mild flutter on social media with rumours that Francisco Sardinha may be replaced as the Congress candidate but the Congress leadership dismissed that rumour immediately and disclosed that Sardinha would be filling his nomination on Tuesday.
Some Congress leaders opined that the rumour could be an off shoot of Fr Eremito Rebello’s diatribe against Sardinha wherein he had accused the Congress candidate of being not only out of synch with the aspirations of the people of the constituency but even taking stands contrary to the Congress.
However, Fr Eremito clarified that he was not at all involved in any movement to get Sardinha replaced as the Congress candidate but admitted that he had told many people known to him why Francisco Sardinha was not a worthy candidate.
“Even though the Congress MLAs in the last Assembly resolved against the Mopa airport being set up in Goa, Sardinha has openly and constantly declared that he is in favour of the second airport which is not the opinion of a large section of the people from South Goa,” said Fr Eremito.
Besides, he also pointed out that Sardinha has not really spoken in favour of Special Status for Goa even though that was promised by the country’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru when he promised to keep Goa’s unique identity intact.
“Sonia Gandhi had also promised special status and more recently Rahul Gandhi informed Goencho Avaz that he agrees with the demand but surprisingly Francisco Sardinha has remained silent on this major demand of all Goans,” he said.
