After drawing a blank in assembly polls wants to make a come back
TEAM HERALD
teamherald@herald-goa.com
MARGAO: Trinamool Congress on Tuesday said it was proud and privileged to welcome PWD Minister Churchill Alemao into its fold, even as it claimed of being a truly secular front of having no history of playing the Hindu, Muslim or Christian card.
Addressing the media after admitting Churchill and his supporters into the party, Trinamool Congress general secretary, youth president and Sports and Transport Minister, Madan Mitra said the TMC is not too late in entering Goa, while exuding confidence that the party would do well under Churchill’s leadership in Goa. “The TMC believes in communal harmony. We respect the basic character of Goa and intellectual people who are looking beyond the BJP and the Congress”, Mitra told the media.
“The TMC is a young party and Churchill is not new to Goa”, he said, when asked why the party disappeared from the state after it drew a blank in the 2012 assembly polls. He could not answer whether Dr Wilfred de Souza is still heading the Goa unit of the TMC or not.
Churchill will file his nomination papers for the South Goa seat on Trinamool Congress ticket on Wednesday, even as the former PWD Minister maintained the party will not only win the South Goa seat but will form the next government in Goa after the next assembly election.
He said the TMC will hold an unprecedented public meeting in South Goa in the run up to the poll, which will be attended by TMC top brass, including party supremo Mamata Banerjee.
Churchill said he hoped the controversy kicked up by Congress’ slander campaign that he took Rs 50 crore to contest the South Goa poll will be put to rest now since he has joined the TMC. “The Congress had created a doubt in the minds of people that I am contesting the poll to split the vote by accepting Rs 50 crore from the BJP. I have now joined the TMC and will contest to win the poll”, Churchill said.
Asked whether Youth Congress President and daughter Valanka would join the new party, Churchill shot back, “Why should Valanka join me? She takes her own decisions. There are many families wherein its members are members of different parties”.
Churchill said he would work for a financial package to bail out the mining industry and vowed to work for scrapping of the proposed Mopa airport.
When a scribe drew attention of the TMC Sports and Transport Minister Madan Mitra that the party has given the ticket to a person with a criminal case, he shot back, “There are 29 cases registered against me in West Bengal. These cases were registered against me when we were fighting against the Communists in Bengal all these years”.
“The Congress had created a doubt in the minds of people that I am contesting the poll to split the vote by accepting Rs 50 crore from the BJP. I have now joined the TMC and will contest to win the poll”, Churchill said
