the goan I network
PANAJI
Goa Pradesh Congress Committee President Girish Chodankar on Wednesday threw a challenge at Deputy Chief Minister Chandrakant Kavlekar to walk his talk, while he was Opposition Leader, to highlight rampant corruption in the Town and Country Planning Department when it was held by Vijai Sardesai, his immediate predecessor in the cabinet.
Chodankar, who addressed his first press conference since the party was hit by an exodus of 10 of its 15 MLAs led by Kavlekar who crossed floors and joined the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, warned that if he fails to purge the department of graft in a reasonable time, the Congress will not hesitate to torment him.
Kavlekar stunned everyone last week when he led a splinter group of 10 MLAs and merged with the BJP while he was still the leader of the Congress Legislature Party and by implication occupying the Constitutional post of Opposition Leader.
He was inducted in the cabinet, allotted the TCP portfolio among others and made Deputy CM.
Two other rebels - Jennifer Monserrate and Filipe Neri Rodrigues - and former deputy speaker Michael Lobo were also inducted into the cabinet after the three ministers of Sardesai-led Goa Forward party and Independent Rohan Khaunte were sacked.
Meanwhile, Chodankar said, the party may approach the judiciary after studying the chronology and paper work of the defection of the 10 MLAs. He said, he continues to shoulder the responsibility of State chief of the party until the party’s central leadership makes alternate arrangements, despite his resignation over the Lok Sabha and assembly bye-elections.
Chodankar said the Congress was considering taking the matter for adjudication by the High Court.
“With sheer “money power” the BJP has unleashed a deplorable trend across the nation and hurt democracy by ‘buying’ MLAs. All the new entrants into the BJP will soon discover the true colours of saffron once they are back-stabbed just as all who defected into it did since the 1990s.”
