MAPUSA
Shubangi Vaigankar will be the new chairperson of Mapusa Municipal Council (MMC) while Chandrashekar Benkar her deputy as only two of them filed their nominations for the top two posts of the council on Wednesday.
With this development, the special council meeting on Thursday to elect the chairperson and the vice-chairperson will be reduced to a mere formality.
The opposition-backed panel Mapshakarancho Ekvott, which has been reduced to five members from earlier nine, decided to back Vaigankar as the chairperson in the interest of Mapusa.
“Since we want development in Mapusa, we have not fielded any candidate for the top post. The chairperson is of everyone and we expect development in town. Our support will be for the chairperson,” said Sudhir Kandolkar, Congressman and the leader of Mapshakarancho Ekvott.
The BJP-backed panel Mapusa Development Front faced its worst performance in Mapusa after just nine of its candidates managed to emerge victorious much against the ruling party’s expectations in the civic election held last month.
The BJP expected that its panel would not do as well as it did in the previous term but expected to get a clear majority in the council.
While nine candidates were elected from the BJP-backed MDF, the opposition-backed ME put up a good show with nine of its candidates emerging triumphant. Two others were elected as Independent.
After the election, the scene shifted to form the council and the ruling BJP managed to first target Shubangi Vaigankar of the opposition panel who it managed to rope into the party and later got three others of the opposition-backed panel - Tarak Arolkar, Vikas Arolkar and Viraj Phadte to gain entry into the BJP.
The BJP-backed Mapusa Development Front is sitting pretty with the support of 14 councillors as the party claims that one of the Independents, Prakash Bhivshet, has also expressed his wish to join the BJP.
