TEAM HERALD
PANJIM: A day after all Catholic MLAs, across parties joined hands for a revolt against the BJP government in support of the Church educational body – Diocesan Society of Education (DSE) – cracks have begun to show between the ruling and opposition MLAs. On Thursday, MLAs of the ruling alliance sidelined the opposition MLAs by taking the initiative in resolving the crisis, a move aimed at gaining them minority support.
Environment Minister Alina Saldanha of the BJP and Labour Minister Avertano Furtado an Independent MLA took charge and decided to hold a separate meeting with Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar to pressurize the government in resolving the educational crisis pertaining to diocesan schools. Unfortunately for them the Chief Minister, who was in his constituency in Mandrem, was not available.
Catholic MLAs, of the ruling and opposition, had on Wednesday announced that they would jointly petition the chief minister on Thursday. This decision was changed with two different meetings with chief minister – one that of ruling MLAs followed by a joint meeting of all Catholic MLAs with representatives from Diocesan Schools – scheduled. The Congress was unhappy with the decision.
Interestingly, the convener of this group – Congress MLA Mauvin Godinho – was also kept away by the ruling MLAs.
“Don’t ask me anything about the meeting. They (ruling) have not informed me about the meeting with the chief minister. They want to take all the credit. We were united on the first day, now there seems to be some different matter,” Congress MLA Alexio Reginaldo Lourenco told Herald.
When contacted Godinho said, “It has been decided that BJP MLAs will meet the CM first and then the entire delegation.” He, however, refused to state the reason for this. Congress legislators – Lourenco, Godinho and Jennifer Monserrate – were present during the meeting on Wednesday chaired by DSE secretary Fr Zeferino D’Souza.
A senior Congress MLA (non-Catholic) said, “These are all tactics to impress minorities. The Archbishop himself is very upset with the BJP government and hence all these moves are to impress him and the Catholic community.”
Ruling alliance MLAs – Saldanha, Furtado, Michael Lobo and Benjamin Silva – met on Thursday morning as the chief minister was not available. “We have decided that only ruling MLAs, including independents, will meet the Chief Minister first and pursue the demand. The entire delegation will meet later,” Lobo said refusing to elaborate.
