Victoria spent more than Babush last elections

TEAMHERALD
teamherald@herald-goa.com
PANJIM: Strange as it may appear, St. Cruz legislator Victoria Fernandes was the highest poll spender amongst winning candidates in north Goa during the  2007 elections.

Even more interesting, her expenses were more than that of Atanasio “Babush,”Monserrate and Vishwajit Rane  — both political heavyweights —  known to dole out words and much more during their campaigns.

While Babush is worth more than Rs 15 crore and Vishwajit more than Rs 7 crore (according to the affidavit filed before the Election Commission), Victoria has  assets worth  Rs 44 lakh.

Victoria’s poll expense in 2007, according to her submission before the Election Commission, was Rs 3.62 lakh  —  much more than Babush (Rs 2.87 lakh) and Vishwajit (Rs 3.02 lakh).

 As many as three candidates in the north of Goa have submitted messy, really messy poll expenditure sheets.

Take the example of Victoria,  whose expenditure sheet has been attached. The lone lady representative thought it fit to change her figures at least thrice  –, and that too on the final submitted sheet. First, there were some figures. Then, they were cancelled and replaced with another. Subsequently,,both these figures were covered with a correction fluid, and the final figures were put in place.

Francis Silveira, Pandurang Madkaikar  late Gurudas Gauns, Babu Azgaonkar, Francis D’Souza, Dayanand Sopte and Dilip Parulekar goofed up their accounts, forcing them to make some minor and some major changes and cancellations, and splattered their submission sheets with white ink.

Among the list of candidates, only Agnelo Fernandes spent money given to him by his party. The columns of the expenses incurred by the `political party which set him up’ and expenses of any other association or body of persons or individuals are completely blank.

All other candidates have had their parties spending on them though. But all Agnelo has done is take a grant of Rs 3-lakh from the Congress, which set him up.

Saligao MLA Dilip Parulekar spent the least on his election campaign — only Rs 93,785, with all the other MLAs from north Goa coming in between.

Box of MLAs and their expenses in rupees: