Team Herald
PANJIM: Goa’s oldest regional party Maharashtrawadi Gomanatk Party (MGP) has managed to park itself with the winning side once again.
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After having fought the elections against the Bharatiya Janata Party and in alliance with the Trinamool Congress Party, the MGP on Monday met Governor Sreedharan Pillai with a letter offering support for the Pramod Sawant government.
The party has been in every government since 2000, with the exception of the last government, when the party was dropped after two of its MLAs defected to the BJP. Between 1990 and 2000 it was also party of various governments, but also spent time in the opposition.
In a major U-turn, MGP leader Ramkrishna (Sudin) Dhavalikar on Monday denied that he had had any differences with Chief Minister Dr Pramod Sawant in the past and claimed that he had never said that he will not work with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the future.
After submitting a letter to the Governor extending his party’s support to Sawant, Dhavalikar told the media that Sawant is a good man and that he had worked with him in the past.
“Sawant has been elected as leader to head the government. He is a good man and I had worked with him in the past. But in between something happened and I had go aside,” Dhavalikar said, adding, “People have accepted him and I too have accepted him.”
To a question, Dhavalikar said that though he is a senior MLA, MGP could win only two seats and could not form the government. He said that he had been appealing to the people to elect any one party with a majority of 22 seats and not to elect defectors.
Dhavalikar claimed that soon after the Assembly results were declared on March 10, Union Home Minister Amit Shah telephonically spoke to him seeking support and that the MGP extended its unconditional support to the BJP.
Dhavalikar denied that he had ever said anything about not supporting the BJP and declined to react when asked whether he was on record that he would never join a Sawant government in the future.
