From Bhai to Chota Bhai

TEAM HERALD
PANJIM: The Bharatiya Janata Party has retained the Panjim assembly seat for the fifth consecutive time, with Sidharth Kuncalienker registering a thumping win over Surendra Furtado of the Congress. The victory margin was 5, 368 votes, a little less than the over 6000 vote margin that Panjim’s longtime MLA and now Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar had won by in 2012.
“People have expressed confidence in the government and in Parrikar, who served the city for 20 years. Moreover, the party workers believed in me and worked whole-heartedly to ensure my win,” Kuncalienker, who was smeared with colour by supporters, said soon after the results were declared.
Stating that his priority would be to handle waste management and traffic, the first time MLA said, he would take all sections of society, including the opposition into confidence, to carry out the developmental works.
Counting was taken up in three rounds on Monday at the old Goa Medical College building in the city with 10 booths in each round. The counting saw Kuncalienker maintain a healthy lead that kept mounting. In the first round, he led by 1920 votes, which shot up to 4368 votes by the second round and at the end of the third round the BJP candidate had sealed his victory by defeating the city mayor and Congress candidate by 5368 votes.
Even before the final results were declared, hundreds of animated BJP workers outside the counting centre had begun victory celebrations, which saw the lighting of firecrackers and dancing. Once the results were announced BJP supporters took out a motorcade through the city streets.
BJP had been aiming for 12,000 votes, more than the 11,086 votes polled by Parrikar in the 2012 assembly elections. However, Kuncalienker polled 1097 votes less than his predecessor as the polling percentage also dropped from 77 per cent to 71.20 per cent. Compared to 16,839 Panjim voters who exercised their franchise in 2012, this time 15,704 voters cast their votes in the by-election.
The Congress was disappointed as Furtado managed to secure just 4621 votes, which was less than the 5018 votes polled by previous Congress candidate Yatin Parekh in 2012. Accepting defeat, Furtado claimed that a majority of the Congress workers backed him during the campaign. “I wish for greater development,” he said, while refusing to comment whether the debacle was a vote in favour of the government or the result of St Cruz MLA Atanasio (Babush) Monserrate campaigning against him. Interestingly, in the Lok Sabha election, amidst allegations of minimal campaigning, Congress candidate Ravi Naik had polled 4529 votes, while the BJP had managed 9785, registering a difference of 5,256 votes.
Independents Samir Kerekar got 624 votes and Sadanand Vaigankar polled 140 votes, while 330 electors pressed the NOTA (None Of The Above) button on the electronic voting machines.
The Panjim by-poll was necessitated as the seat fell vacant in November 2014, after Parrikar resigned following his elevation as defence minister.