When media persons asked Returning Officer Mahesh Nadkarni if the chief minister had spoken to him, Nadkarni said “The CM had spoken to me and asked me to go in for secret ballot.” What raised eyebrows was the intervention by the chief minister at a sarpanch’s election, especially when Parrikar was present for a session in the Assembly around that time.
Did the chief minister really call?
The phone call purportedly made by Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar aroused a lot of interest, especially among media persons whether it was Parrikar’s call or if it had been made by someone else in his name.

