the goan I network
PANAJI
In his second major Cabinet shake-up since taking over reins from late Manohar Parrikar, Chief Minister Pramod Sawant sacked Deputy Chief Minister Vijai Sardesai and three other ministers before inducting three of the 10 Congress rebels who on Wednesday had ‘merged’ with the BJP along with Deputy Speaker Michael Lobo at a ceremony held at the Raj Bhavan on Saturday.
The development was a corollary to Wednesday’s dramatic political coup engineered by the Sawant-led BJP in which it scooped 10 of the 15 MLAs of the Opposition Congress.
Chandrakant (Babu) Kavlekar, Deputy Speaker Michael Lobo, Taleigao legislator Jennifer Monserrate and Velim MLA Filipe Neri Rodrigues were administered the oath of office and secrecy as cabinet ministers by Governor Mridula Sinha. All four new ministers took their oaths in English.
The swearing-in ceremony took place at the Raj Bhavan in the afternoon, hours after the Governor issued a notification which said she had accepted Sawant’s recommendation that Sardesai, Rohan Khaunte, Vinoda Paliencar and Jayesh Salgaonkar shall “cease to be ministers.”
Kavlekar, who was Opposition Leader when he took the dramatic decision to lead a 10-member splinter group of the Congress to merge with the BJP will be made Deputy Chief Minister, according to Sawant.
The Chief Minister who spoke to journalists on the sidelines of the swearing-in ceremony said the four new ministers will be allocated portfolios soon.
He also indicated that the notification formally allocating portfolios to Kavlekar, Lobo, Filipe Neri and Ms Monserrate will be issued on Monday, ahead of the Goa
legislative assembly convening on that day for its monsoon session. A few hours before the ceremony, Sawant had sacked Sardesai and three other non-BJP ministers including Rohan Khaunte, the independent MLA from Porvorim, and the two MLAs of Sardesai’s Goa Forward Party -- Vinoda Paliencar and Jayesh Salgaonkar.
The sacking was resorted to as the foursome refused to put in their papers as requested by Sawant on Friday afternoon.
Sardesai took the stand that they were part of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and the instruction to resign should have come from the Central leadership. He had also said on Friday that he was getting indirect feelers from the BJP high command that the stand-off could be amicably resolved.
Art and Culture Minister Govind Gaude, the independent legislator from Priol is the only non-BJP minister to have survived the political storm that has hit Goa since Wednesday.
Sawant, meanwhile, denied he had done injustice to anyone and said the decision to replace ministers and Wednesday’s political strike in which 10 Congress MLAs joined his party was in keeping with its national strategy of wanting its own full majority government.
Sawant also said it is politically reasonable for a political party to have its own majority government and on instructions from his central leadership he had dropped and replaced the four ministers.
Rajya Sabha MP and the BJP’s State president who attended Saturday’s swearing-in ceremony termed this week’s developments as part of the trend all over the country where leaders of the Congress and other parties are joining the BJP.
Tendulkar also brushed aside questions from journalists over the visible discontent among party old guard and cadres over induction of some tainted politicians from among the group of 10 Congress rebels into the party.
“All will have to tolerate it and move ahead together,” was Tendulkar’s terse response to persistent questioning.
