PANAJI
Finally, nearly three weeks after the results of the assembly election, the stage is set for the swearing-in of the new government at a ceremony to be held at 11 am on Monday at the Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee stadium, Bambolim.
Chief Minister-designate Pramod Sawant will be administered the oath of office and secrecy by Governor P S Sreedharan Pillai at the ceremony which is slated to be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other top national leaders of the ruling BJP, including some chief ministers of other States.
Although there was no official word from the BJP-led ruling coalition, seven other ministers are also expected to take oath simultaneously with Sawant on Monday.
The swearing-in ceremony has been thrown open to the public and BJP sources said more than 10,000 people are expected to attend the event which will be broadcast live nationally.
Meanwhile, of much interest at the ceremony will be the question of who Sawant will pick to be part of his team of 11 in the cabinet.
According to top BJP sources, Sawant is expected to opt for a two phase process and will appoint just seven ministers who will be sworn in along with him on Monday.
As per Constitutional requirement, Sawant can have in total just 11 members in his cabinet and the four slots which will remain after Monday's swearing-in ceremony are being kept apparently as a bait to garner support of additional MLAs.
Three slots will in all probability go to the allies -- Sudin Dhavalikar of MGP and the two Independents Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco and Dr Chandrakant Shetye -- according to the sources.
That leaves Sawant with the tough task of picking just eight from the politically top-heavy group of 19 BJP MLAs and one of these eight slots will most certainly go to Rane.
There will therefore leave at least 11 heavyweights vying for the balance seven posts namely, former chief minister Ravi Naik, outgoing ministers Mauvin Godinho, Jennifer Monserrate, Nilesh Cabral and Govind Gaude, besides former ministers and multiple term legislators such as Atanasio Monserrate, Subhash Shirodkar, Rohan Khaunte, Nilkanth Halarnkar, Subhash Phaldesai and Ganesh Gaonkar.
Sawant, who became chief minister following the death of Manohar Parrikar in 2019, had led the BJP into the February 14 assembly election. The party won exactly half of the 40 seats and emerged the single largest party but fell short of the simple majority mark by just one.
Within hours of the results being declared the BJP claimed the support of five more elected MLAs, including two of the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) and three Independents.
The Opposition Congress won just 11 and was left way behind in the race for power.
Having led the party to a favourable mandate in the polls, however, did not make Sawant's bid to claim the Chief Minister's post a smooth affair and he faced a stiff challenge from Vishwajit Rane.
The deadlock of sorts was only broken at the intervention of Union Home Minister Amit Shah who held a meeting at his official residence in Delhi where the disagreement between Sawant and Rane were sorted.
