the goan I network
PANAJI
The ruling Bharaitya Janata Party (BJP) has decided to make Friday’s rally in support of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) in the capital a ‘Shaktipradarshan’ (show of strength) and has put its recent entrants from the Congress on notice to mobilize crowds.
Signs that the ten former Congress MLAs who defected to the BJP in July last year, notably Panaji MLA Atanasio (Babush) Monserrate, have come under pressure to prove their political muscle with support to CAA as the acid test, came early Thursday morning.
Monserrate apparently engineered a coup and had almost the entire Panaji Block of the Congress revolt on the CAA issue.
The Block president Prasad Amonkar bared the revolt with an impromptu press conference in the city and minutes later, State Congress president, Girish Chodankar announced the dissolution of the block committee.
Later on Thursday afternoon, Amonkar and two others joined the BJP in the presence of Monserrate, and ironically, ex-MLA Siddharth Kuncolienkar who was defeated in a bitterly fought bye-election in May last year.
Several other members of the bloc of 10 ex-Congress-current-BJP MLAs have also
been issued targets to mobilize people for the pro-CAA rally in Panaji on Friday. None of them were willing to come on record on the diktat from the leadership, though.
Earlier, BJP state president Vinay Tendulkar alleged that only “urban naxalites” and the Congress, Samajwadi Party, BSP were opposing the CAA without studying it.
“Even in foreign countries people are supporting CAA. In Maharastra, people came out in lakhs in support of the bill”, Tendulkar claimed, adding that nearly 27,000 workers are expected to attend the pro-CAA rally on Friday which will be led by the National executive president J P Nadda.
It will commence at EDC, Patto Plazza and culminate into a public meeting at Azad Maidan after wending its way through the city.
