MARGAO
The Congress leadership may have to grapple with another ticklish question thrown up by the Zilla Panchayat poll debacle “ how to win back the Scheduled Tribes community to its fold ahead of the 2022 Assembly battle.
Wednesday saw the BJP ST leaders basking in glory at the South district party office, with the party felicitating as many as nine members of the Scheduled tribes, who have got elected to Zilla Panchayats -- seven to the South Goa seat and two elected to the North Goa ZP. Some of these new ZP members have got elected for reserved seats, while others in general categories as the BJP seemed to have literally had a free run in the reserved as well as non-reserved ZP seats in the state.
In South Goa, as many as seven Scheduled Tribes candidates got elected on the Lotus symbol, with the BJP dominating the hinterland areas, leaving the Congress nowhere in the interiors of the district.
While the Congress managed to win just three seats in its stronghold Salcete, the results have shown the party could not handle the BJP heat in the hinterland seats of South Goa, including the ST dominated belt of Canacona, Quepem and Sanguem.
What apparently made matters worse for the Congress camp was the fact that the Congress-turned-BJP MLAs, including DyCM Chandrakant Kavlekar and Isidore Fernandes worked hard to ensure that the BJP candidates win in the ST dominated seats of South Goa.
This has thrown up a peculiar question to Goa Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) Chief Girish Chodankar and Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader Digambar Kamat how to win back the ST leaders and the community back to the party fold ahead of the 2022 Assembly election.
What may further compound the problem for the Congress leadership to establish rapport with the Scheduled Tribes is the fact there’s not a single ST leader of a big stature in the party-fold, who can be drafted for the job of regaining the confidence of the Scheduled Tribes community.
GPCC Chief Girish Chodankar, when asked to shed light on the party’s failure to win a single seat in ST dominated areas of South Goa, said it was not just because of the ST factor that the party badly lost the election, but the way the government went about holding the elections.
Girish, however, conceded that the party is facing a dearth of leaders from the ST community for various leaders. “We have lost some of the top ST leaders. The party is aware of the situation. We will soon embark on a mission to build the party in the hinterland areas, and restore confidence of the ST community in the Congress party”, Girish said.
Commenting on the situation, Leader of Opposition, Digambar Kamat, said though the election results do not reflect the ground reality, it is indeed a matter of concern that the Congress could not do much in the ST dominated areas of the state. “There was not much time to prepare for the ZP election for varios reasons. In the bargain, the party must have not taken social engineering into account”, Kamat said, while saying the party will groom leaders in the ST community to take the party ideals and principles to the remotest corner of the state.
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Rao takes all on
board ahead of
submitting report
MARGAO: Congress Goa desk in-charge, Dinesh Gundu Rao is expected to submit a detailed report to the Party High command on how to go about reviving the party ahead of the 2022 Assembly election.
That the AICC Secretary took time off to rush to the residence of Navelim MLA Luizinho Faleiro after his interaction with party leaders in the South district office indicates that Rao took care to ensure all party leaders are made a part of the ongoing consultative process.
>> See pg 2
