MAPUSA
The fight for the picturesque Aldona assembly seat used to be two-cornered until the last time when the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) decided to challenge the two national parties “ BJP and Congress. This time, however, TMC’s Kiran Kandolkar has added an interesting fourth dimension twist to the political tale.
President of the TMC’s Goa unit, Kandolkar has been eyeing the Aldona seat even when he had a brief sojourn with the Goa Forward Party.
He had started taking baby steps in his political journey in the constituency more than a year ago but got a big boost when the Arolkar brothers joined forces with him.
Besides, Kandolkar has managed to impregnate the BJP citadel in various other pockets of the constituency.
Brothers, Tarak Arolkar and Vikas Arolkar are councillors of wards 7 and 8 of the Mapusa Municipal Council, which comes under Aldona in the assembly elections.
These are two crucial wards that BJP used to get a maximum lead in the assembly election. It was earlier represented by the BJP-backed councillors.
Aldona MLA, Glenn Ticlo is trying for a hat-trick in the constituency on the BJP ticket and has been leaving no stone unturned to achieve that target.
Backing him is Chief Minister Pramod Sawant who has assured to make Ticlo a minister if he gets elected from Aldona.
Congress has fielded a loyal soldier and a professional, Carlos Ferreira who has been a former Advocate General of the State and former additional solicitor of India.
Considered as a friend of the public interest litigant, Ferreira has helped people with different political leanings pro bono and comes off as an amiable character.
Besides, AAP’s Mahesh Satelkar and Pooja Mayekar and Govind Govenkar as Independents are also contesting from Aldona.
For the first time in his decade-old political career, Ticlo is facing a tough challenge from the aggressive campaign launched by Congress and TMC.
A resident of Nachinola who is also the president of the farmers club, Vithal Naik said, “Unemployment has been a big issue in Aldona. Most of our youth have not got jobs for the last 10 years. Secondly, the farmers of the village have been left high and dry on various issues. We were promised irrigation water from the Tillari canal but nothing has happened for the last several years. Similarly, we were asked to fill forms for organic fertilizer but six months down the line we have not heard a word about the scheme.”
According to another resident of Aldona, Oldrin Pereira, unemployment and reconstruction of the market building were two crucial issues in the constituency.
In the 2017 assembly election, Glenn Ticlo had defeated Amarnath Panjikar of the Congress by a margin of 4,456 votes. AAP had polled 3,272 votes closely followed by MGP with 3,000.
A local political observer informed that the entry of Kiran Kandolkar has hit the BJP hard especially in the segments dominated by the majority community in the constituency.
“And if minority votes consolidate towards Congress, Ticlo could be in a real problem,” the observer said.
