NCP may spoil Cong chances
SANDESH PRABHUDESAI, PANAJI | 20 August 1999 16:18 IST
With Goa being one of the few states the Nationalist Congress Party has fielded its candidates, the ruling Congress party here appears to be in little trouble as it fears that the traditional minority Christian vote bank may split.
Sharad Pawar, the NCP president, has rightly chosen Dr Wilfred de Souza, former chief minister and a self-styled Christian leader, to float his outfit here in the tourist state. De Souza, the sitting MLA, is also contesting the elections this time from South Goa, where the Christian vote bank becomes the decisive factor. Ramakant Angle, the BJP candidate from the South, frankly admits that his victory would depend on the role de Souza would play in splitting the minority votes, especially in the Christian-dominated Salcete taluka. Though the BJP lost to the Congress last year only by 7800 votes in the South, former Congress MP Francisco Sardinha could sail through only because of the huge margin of over 27,000 votes he secured in Salcete taluka. "Dr de Souza is planted by Pawar against his wishes to help the BJP to win", alleges chief minister Luizinho Faleiro, indirectly supporting Angle’s contention. While similar is the case in North Goa, where the NCP is contesting, Faleiro feels educated Goan voters are shrewd enough to understand Pawar’s pro-BJP game. Reacting sharply, de Souza however claims that Pawar would ultimately rule the country, not by aligning with the BJP but by splitting the Congress soon after the polls. "We don’t want to have any kind of relation with communal elements", he asserts, flaying Faleiro’s contention. With the whole National Democratic Alliance not getting beyond 200 seats and the Congress scoring less than 100 this time, de Souza predicts that the split would occur in both the Congress as well as the NDA, who would join the NCP to make Pawar the prime minister.
He even claims that this would obviously result in collapse of the Congress government in Goa. Though revolt within the Congress over non-expansion of the six-member cabinet is still the issue, Faleiro has now dangled the carrot of legislators’ performance during the polls to decide who should be inducted.
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