MARGAO
On a day when All India Congress Committee (AICC) Goa desk in-charge Dinesh Gundu Rao landed in Goa to take stock of the political situation, the Congress leadership may have to answer a crucial and oft-repeated question “ can the party score all the eight goals in its stronghold Salcete with or without alliance with like-minded parties in the 2022 Assembly election?
This question assumes significance against the backdrop of persistent attempts made by the new players, including the Aam Admi Party, vying for the political space in Saxtti countryside all these years. And, this question may further come to haunt party leaders with like-minded parties such as the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the regional outfit Goa Forward, equally waiting for the principal opposition party to concede them their space in the minority stronghold. And, not to forget new players, including the Revolutionary Goans, besides a couple of present and former MLAs, who are all expected to throw their hat in the ring as Independents.
For, party insiders say a clean sweep in the party’s power house can take the Congress within the striking distance of reaching the magic figure of 21 to return back to power after a decade in the opposition.
As the Goa desk in-charge goes into a brainstorming session with party leaders for the next three days, Congress leaders in private say Salcete still remains the hope to bounce back in 2022.
A clean sweep in Salcete with eight goals on the score board, leaders say, would only make the party’s task easy to score the remaining 13 goals from as many as 32 seats and ride back to power.
Statistics from 2012 and 2017 elections show how important Salcete holds for the Congress if the party nurses hopes of returning to power. In 2012, the Congress won just two out of the eight seats at stake, and the party’s overall tally in the Legislative Assembly dropped to single digit figure. Take note, the BJP had bagged just a lone seat in Salcete in 2012, but the Congress fort had crumbled after being bombed by Independents and candidates winning on the banner of regional parties.
Comparatively, the 2017 election brought smiles back on party leaders when the Congress came close to forming the government by winning 17 seats, thanks to the six seats the party won from Salcete. The remaining two seats had gone to the NCP and Goa Forward party, though there was no formal alliance with these like-minded parties, leaving the saffron party without any representation in the taluka.
Against this backdrop, Congress leaders in private say the first task before the party leadership is to put the Salcete house in order, first, by capping the leadership issue on priority and then going about the job of sorting out issues, including tie-ups with like-minded opposition parties and selection of candidates.
The leadership issue, party insiders say, is important for the simple reason that all the key players, including incumbent GPCC Chief Girish Chodankar, Leader of Opposition Digambar Kamat, besides prospective candidates for the top party post, Luizinho Faleiro, MP Francsico Sardinha and Alexio Sequeira, and not to mention three-time MLA Alexio Reginaldo Lourenco, all hail from the minority stronghold. And, it’s an open secret that some of these leaders do not see eye to eye and are grouped into factions.
In this background, the Goa desk in-charge, Dinesh Gundu Rao has a task clear, to fix the leadership issue to kick-start the election campaign from its stronghold Salcete and sort out the alliance issues if the party is keen to take other like-minded parties along in the battle against the BJP.
Former Chief Minister, late Manohar Parrikar had once remarked that the Congress enjoys an advantage over other political players when the party descends on the election arena. “In a football match, the teams enjoy a level playing field with the scoreboard 0-0. In an election battle in Goa, the Congress starts the match with the score board 13-0 in its favour, leaving the opposition parties to struggle from the bottom to reach the magic figure of 21”, late Parrikar had remarked.
What Parrikar actually meant was that the Congress is rest assured of pocketing the seats in the minority areas, including the eight seats in Salcete, making the party’s task easy of getting the simple majority.
