Ward 3 in Quepem is all set to be a straight fight between Congress and Independent candidates. On Tuesday, Filu D’Costa filed a nomination for ward 3. D’Costa, who is a panel member and strong supporter of the present Chairperson, Dayesh Naik and Congress MLA Babu Kavlekar will take on businessman Yogesh Bene in the forthcoming election.
D’Costa is the husband of former Chairperson, Lydia D’Costa. After receiving backing from Kavlekar, Filu got elected in the last election from ward 3. This time there is a possibility that he will have to face a strong fight from Bene. Bene doesn’t have any political background. He is a real estate developer by profession and is heard of having being close with some BJP workers in Quepem. However, there is no clarity on whether the BJP will endorse Bene as a candidate.
“I have not completed the required legal formalities for candidature filing,” said Bene to Herald. However, D’Costa said that he is fully prepared to go for the polls.
Quepem MLA, Kavlekar meanwhile, hasn’t taken any decision over his panel for this election. However, it is evidently clear that if D’Costa being attached to the Congress, he will be the obvious selection in the panel after Dayesh Naik. D’Costa had won the ward with 250 votes last election. He had 2 opponents against him back then. The delimitation has taken the number of voters in ward 3 to 1200. While speaking to the media, he said, “I have family relations with the people of my ward and haven’t taken any political revenge against anyone. Hence I will get the benefit of that,” adding, “The newly formed ward 5 has my voters base in it. I could have easily got my wife elected from this ward. But I don’t want ‘family raj’, hence I won’t field Lydia in the ward.”
He went on to say that although he didn’t give the youth of his ward government jobs, he did manage to get them private jobs and said that he will rightfully ask them for votes.
