This battle started in the 1994s and Babu Kavlekar, the current Congress sitting MLA, began his journey to overthrow Prakash Velip the then MLA. Babu was a Zilla Panchayat member and Prakash Shankar Velip was a powerful ST leader. Finally in 2003, in his third attempt, Babu overthrew Prakash Velip and subsequently he has stayed on the top across elections in the year 2007 and 2012. But once again now in 2016, the battle focus is the same.
Babu versus Prakash Velip Sr, who’s the BJP Vice-President but now there are more players in the ring and the battle royale is much more intense. It’s also a three-way battle this year between Congress versus BJP and also new entrants AAP though Aam Admi Party’s Quepem candidate is not new to politics but is a six-term municipality councillor himself, namely Manuel Colaco.
But beyond the politics, the various issues need to be boxed and checked. “Quepem is developing, the traffic is growing, the town is getting congested, parking is an issue, the market is cramped and literally doesn’t exist, the mining dominance is gone and these needs to be addressed besides development of the large ST population but all this is ignored,” explains Jackson Pereira from Betul.
A relatively long constituency from Betul to Fatorpa to Tilamol and the interiors of Quepem village and Paroda, the constituency has a mix of people from strong BJP supporters to the Catholic ST voters and a staunch MGP vote bank.
“Babu’s involvement in all the industrial estate GSIDC scam in Verna and other parts of Goa has cast doubts on his integrity. Even when Babu Kavlekar came on the streets with Goa Congress President Luizinho Faleiro to protest against the DefExpo, but backtracked when the BJP raised allegations of his involvement in industrial estate land scam”, said one Congress worker.
But all is not so good for Babu in the Congress. While he’s sure to bag a ticket as the sitting MLA, Babu wants more than one ticket. He wants the Congress to give his wife Vrushal a ticket from Sanguem to contest against Subhash Phal Dessai.
“Babu is very much with us but right now he’s sitting on the fence as he wants us to give his wife a ticket from Sanguem, that’s something we can’t decide right now,” explains Congress President Luizinho Faleiro.
Babu himself downplays all the rumours to say, “Till date, I am a Congressman so I don’t want the controversy and will contest on the same ticket mostly.” Readers please note, the operative words in his comment are “till date”, and “mostly”.
Similarly Prakash Velip in 2012, resigned from the BJP to contest as an independent candidate since the BJP gave the seat to the MGP alliance while the ‘other’, Prakash Arjun Velip, Junior, the former PA of Digambar Kamat contested on the MGP ticket while the fourth contestant was Manuel Colaco, then the sitting Quepem Municipality Chairperson.
But Manuel has now changed sides and is tipped to be the AAP candidate.
Also vying for the BJP ticket is Sazil DeCosta, Fatorpa Sarpanch, who hopes to beat Babu by being a Catholic face for the party while industrialist Nitin Kunkoliencar’s brother Yogesh Kunkolienkar is also hoping for the BJP ticket besides of course BJP Vice President Prakash Velip Sr who hopes to contest his 6th election along with his Junior namesake Prakash Arjun Velip, who’s still around and has been working on various UTAA and ST/SC schemes across Quepem. He is banking on the fact that the MGP-BJP alliance may once again give the ticket to MGP which makes him the front runner to be the Opposition candidate for the BJP-MGP alliance.
“We prefer a change this election and whoever is the new MLA, I hope the real issues of Quepem constituency are addressed and taken up in 2016 and people are not politically fooled once again,” stated Azin Shaikh, a Quepem resident. Also to be watched is Babu cuddling towards the BJP and he also may just make it but the BJP on one hand wants the cadre and workers united fighting for one candidate.
