PANAJI
For the record both Chief Minister Pramod Sawant and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) central emissary C T Ravi, who is Goa desk in-charge deny it vociferously but the expectation of an imminent Cabinet reshuffle fails to fade away from political and media circles.
On Friday, Ravi had interactions with ministers and MLAs, including the eight who defected from the Congress last month, at the party headquarters in the capital.
Sawant and almost every other minister and MLA of the party were seen trooping into the party headquarters which was out of bounds for the media.
Ravi, according to party sources also held meetings with party officials and prominent workers through Friday but impromptu meetings he had on Thursday night with former chief minister Digambar Kamat and another from among the eight defector MLAs is where the issue of "accommodating" the new entrants was reportedly discussed.
On record however, Kamat dismissed the speculation about Cabinet reshuffle and described his one-on-one meeting with Ravi on Thursday as merely a courtesy call.
"I have to meet him since he is come. After I joined the BJP I have not met any of the Central leaders. So when they come to Goa, I have to meet," Kamat said when asked about his Thursday's meeting.
Aleixo Sequeira who also arrived at the BJP headquarters in Panaji on Friday also denied any knowledge of a Cabinet reshuffle or his inclusion in it.
"I am not aware. I have not been told anything," Sequeira said in response to journalists suggesting that there was 'good news' for him.
"If you were the Chief Minister I would have believed you. I have no knowledge," Sequeira added.
Meanwhile, Ravi arriving in Goa just a day after Sawant returned from a trip to Delhi where he had a meeting with Union Home Minister Amit Shah, is what sent the political grapevine into frenzied activity on Friday on a possible and imminent cabinet reshuffle.
For the record, Ravi denied any political development and claimed his meetings with the ministers, legislators and party workers were related to party work.
"I impressed upon BJP Ministers and MLAs to ensure that the benefits of the 'Double Engine Governments' under Prime Minister Narendra Modi reach the common man,” Ravi told the media.
That Sawant will rejig his team in Goa has been an expectation in political and media circles in Goa ever since the en-masse defections to the BJP by eight of the 11 Opposition Congress legislators on September 14.
A Cabinet reshuffle to induct defectors as a 'pay back' has been the norm rather than the exception in almost all instances of legislators switching over to the ruling side from the Opposition in Goa for the last three decades.
