Congress will field 70% new faces in 2022 polls: State prez

PANJIM: Congress in Goa will field 70 to 80 per cent new faces in the 2022 Assembly elections, Goa Pradesh Congress Party (GPCC) president Girish Chodankar said on Wednesday.

Asked for his reaction over South Goa MP Francisco Sardinha blaming him for the party’s poor performance in the Zilla Panchayat (ZP) polls and demanding his removal from the president’s post, Chodankar said, “People of Goa want young and new faces. We will fulfill the aspirations of the people by fielding 70 to 80 per cent young and new faces in the next Assembly elections.” 

Chodankar claimed that the Congress has fielded a maximum of young and new faces in Assam, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, where Assembly elections are underway.

Refusing to react to Sardinha’s charges, Chodankar said that whatever the MP had said was an internal matter of the party and that he did not want to criticise anybody. “It is within the family. We respect senior members likewise we respect elder members in the family,” he said.

Asked whether senior members were not allowing the second-rung leadership in the party to grow, Chodankar said that youngsters should muster the courage to stand up against them.  

“It is happening in every political party. In BJP veteran leaders like L K Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi were sidelined in the party by new faces,” he said, adding that Congress has always encouraged youngsters and women in the organisation and elections.  

Reiterating that the Congress is changing as per the wishes of the people, Chodankar said that in the 2012 and 2017 Assembly elections, Congress gave tickets to youth and mahilas, unlike Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who he alleged, is using youth and women during elections.

Referring to the elections of mayor and deputy mayor of Panjim, Chodankar demanded to know why both the posts were kept open for the last two terms. He said that at least one of the posts should have been kept reserved for a woman councillor. ‘But it was not done and it is an insult to the people of Panjim,” he said.

Goa Pradesh Mahila Congress committee president Beena Naik, who was present, said they have demanded 30 to 35 per cent tickets to mahilas in the ensuing Assembly elections. She alleged that the BJP was using women and was not giving them tickets to contest Assembly elections because they know that women were sincere and will not indulge in frauds. 

Naik said that though they have been demanding 30 to 35 per cent seats to mahilas, it is the Congress high command that will take a call on this.