PANJIM: Vishwajit Rane seems to have mastered the art of making change work for him like a constant. The Valpoi by-election results have to a large extent brought to a closure, any debate on his ability to change parties and loyalties and win by a bigger margin on each occasion.
And with a bit of fatherly help, with senior Rane gently informing the dominant and loyal Muslims of Sattari, that the Junior would now take charge of the family’s politics in the bastion and they should back him, and with the BJPs chosen emissary Sadanand Sheth Tanavade handpicked to steer the BJP votes and support t their erstwhile bitter rival, the Rane ‘Prince’ was home and dry by over 10,000 votes.
His victory margins have brought to him an aura of absolute invincibility in the region and the ominous news is that the Congress may well be on the road to becoming extinct, atleast for the near future, in an area where the BJP could not even tread.
The sheer numbers carry weight than words. Junior Rane got 16,167 votes, against 6,101 votes polled by Congress candidate Roy Naik.
The galloping margins of Vishwajit, have already gone into the folklore of Goan politics. He plunged into politics in 2007 when he contested as an Independent from Valpoi constituency. He won the seat by defeating BJP’s Puti Gaonkar getting 8,590 votes while Puti managed 5,051 votes. The margin between the two was 3,549 votes.
After extending his support to the ruling Congress-led coalition government, where his father Pratapsingh was a part of, Rane officially joined the party forcing a by-election in 2010. By this time, his fan-following increased manifold leading to an easy victory. Jr Rane got 11,642 votes while BJP, that pitted another candidate H S Tukaram against him, faced defeat yet again. The total votes polled in favour of Tukaram were 3,237, not even close to Puti’s total votes in the previous election. His party was defeated in the 2012 elections but Rane retained his seat. This time BJP fielded Satyavijay Naik against Rane, but the result was the same. The two-time MLA got 12,412 votes against Naik’s 9,473 votes. The victory margin was 2,932 votes.
The gravity defying vote margins continued in 2017. After securing 13,493 votes on Congress ticket and winning the seat fourth-time in a row and then resigning within hours of being sworn in, he contested the by-election on August 23, on BJP ticket and ended up getting got 16,167 votes with a margin of 10,087 votes. An emotional Rane thanked the people of Sattari for reposing faith in him. “This is an overwhelming support by the people of Sattari. The Usgao and Sattari people have reposed their faith in me and I am very thankful to them,” he told reporters after the results.
