MARGAO
The Congress fort crumbled in minority stronghold Salcete as the Opposition party could manage to win only three of the eight seats at stake, leaving it stranded midway in the overall seat tally, dashing hopes of returning to power after a decade.
On the other hand, the Aam Aadmi Party opened its account in the minority stronghold in style, by winning the two seats of Velim and Benaulim. The BJP also scripted history in Salcete as the Lotus bloomed in Navelim for the first time ever in the Congress bastion.
The Trinamool, however, drew a blank in Salcete when the party was expected to pocket a couple of seats. The father-daughter duo of Churchill and Valanka bit dust in Benaulim and Navelim respectively much to the surprise of poll pundits and their supporters, while the party could not make a mark in other seats in the taluka.
The Congress fort crumbled in Curtorim, with Independent Reginaldo Lourenco retaining the seat to play his fourth successive innings from the constituency. The Goa Forward managed to retain Fatorda with party Chief Vijai Sardesai scoring a hatrick by winning the seat for the third time in a row.
Congress’ poor performance in Salcete virtually threw the Opposition’s plan to storm back to power haywire. The party won the seats of Margao (Digambar Kamat), Nuvem (Alexio Sequeira) and Cuncolim from where young Yuri Alemao has made his way to the Assembly. A glance at the poll results shows Congress has gone down in its bastion by three seats compared to the 2017 results when the party had bagged six out of the eight seats. This is perhaps the first time in recent elections that the party’s tally of seats has come down to three. The only time the party’s overall tally had hit below three seats was in 2012, when the party could win just two seats against the strong anti-Congress wave.
While Margao MLA Digambar retained his seat in style with a thumping victory over BJP’s nominee, Dy Chief Minister Manohar Ajgaonkar, his status as the Leader of the Opposition and a Chief Minister in waiting could not help the Congress retain the seats of Navelim, Velim and Curtorim, which the party had won in the 2017 polls.
Party’s decision to shut the doors on Reginaldo Lourenco seemed to have cost the Congress the Curtorim seat. The three-time former Congress MLA, who contested as an Independent, scored his fourth successive win from Curtorim despite the Congress using every possible weapon in its armament, including roping in Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in support of party candidate Moreno Rebello.
What has come as a big surprise to Saxttikars in particular and Goans in general is AAP’s deep inroads in the minority stronghold. While speculations were rife that the AAP may open an account in Goa from Benaulim, the party surprised poll pundits and defied predictions when it wrested the Velim seat, where a host of players and bigwigs, including former Minister Filipe Nery Rodrigues (NCP), former MLA Benjamin D’Silva (TMC) and Congress’ Savio D’Silva were in the fray.
Another major surprise in the minority stronghold came when the Revolutionary Goans Party made huge inroads at the cost of the Congress, which may leave the Congress leadership in an introspection mode why the people in the minority stronghold opted for the nascent party instead of voting for it.
In fact, the RGP made its debut in Salcete in style. Though the party could not open an account in Salcete, its campaign ended with a splendid performance in almost all the eight constituencies, relegating the main players behind in the race.
Goa Forward Party Chief Vijai Sardesai scored a hatrick of sorts in Fatorda, by winning the seat for the third time in a row. His victory margin, however, has raised a question or two and may turn him into an introspection mode. Though the Congress did not contest from Fatorda, with the party leaving the seat to the Goa Forward party, the election results have shown that other non-BJP parties, including the AAP, RG and TMC together ended up in polling close to 3000 votes in the constituency.
