Micky quits BJP within 2 days

| 29 January 2005 22:57 IST

Micky Pacheco, the third legislator, quit the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party today afternoon.

He had joined the saffron brigade two days ago, merging his one-man party, the United Goans Democratic Party (Secular), into the BJP.

“I had gone there to stab chief minister Manohar Parrikar from the front side”, Pacheco told the reporters.

“I don’t believe in backstabbing. It was the part of our game plan”, he said.

Pacheco, former tourism minister in the Parrikar government, was dropped from the cabinet in June last year, claiming that his style of functioning was not proper.

Since then, he was sitting in the opposition camp.

He has now followed Babush Monserette and Isidore Fernandes, who quit the BJP today morning. All three of them were originally elected on tickets of the UGDP and the Congress and had later joined the saffron brigade.

According to Congress high command observer Margaret Alva, a fourth person would also resign from the BJP shortly.

Sources indicate that transport minister Pandurang Madkaikar, who had left the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party to join the saffron camp, has cut short his Delhi trip to quit the party.

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