PANAJI
The monsoon session of the Goa Legislative Assembly will be a 15-working-day affair, and despite a double advantage — a disjointed Opposition to add to its brute 32 versus seven majority in the House of 40 — the Pramod Sawant-led BJP government will still have to pull up its socks if it is to come out unscathed and pass the test of legislative accountability by the end of it.
The session begins on Monday, and the challenge will begin straight away in the morning for Sawant and his ten ministers when they will face probing into the day-to-day functional affairs of their respective departments from the Opposition and other members during Question Hour.
Outgoing Goa Governor P S Sreedharan Pillai has summoned the Assembly for a 15-working-day session beginning on July 21. While much of the time will be consumed by MLAs discussing the State's 2025-26 financial statement (budget) which Sawant presented in March, as well as the demands for grants from various departments for the rest of the current financial year, the government vs Opposition confrontation and their contest to snatch the upper hand in the battle of political narratives promises to be colourful.
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Govt's handicaps
First off, the Government (treasury benches) has a couple of recent developments it will have to take in its stride. Missing in action will be Govind Gaude, who was sacked for raising a controversy and hurling accusations of corruption in the tribal affairs department, which is held by the Chief Minister.
Even if Gaude's exit from the Cabinet could also be a blessing in disguise in some ways, Sawant will have to deal with a few controversial matters pertaining to the Art and Culture and Sports portfolios he held, besides addressing the politically sensitive issues surrounding the restive tribal community of the State.
Next, the treasury benches may also have to deal with the likely absence of the Law and Legislative Affairs Minister, Aleixo Sequeira, who may not be in a position to attend the session. Sequeira is recuperating from a medical transplant procedure and has been advised to isolate himself to ward off the risk of catching infections.
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Top govt biz: Regularisation of illegal houses
Top on the government's list of business during the session will be the legislation it proposes to enact to tackle the illegal houses conundrum in light of the recent directive from the Bombay High Court at Goa to demolish them.
Sawant has made it clear on umpteen occasions in the past that these homes, which have been facing the threat of demolition, will be protected.
The issue was discussed threadbare at the 'coordination meeting' held by the BJP to prepare their MLAs and those of their allies for the session, where Sawant is said to have informed that the government will bring in legislation to regularise the illegal structures on comunidade land and another legislation to save structures on government and public land.
The issue gains significance in the context of the maha-battle — Assembly elections in 2027 — with the BJP's top brass convinced it will bode well for the party if the government succeeds in protecting, through legislation, the thousands of such structures dotting the length and breadth of the State.
The bill to regularise illegal houses on comunidade land, according to government sources, empowers the Administrator of Comunidades — and not the comunidades themselves — to decide on applications for regularising structures on plots under 300 square metres in size.
When the High Court directive came about a month ago, the Sawant government had toyed with the idea of promulgating an Ordinance but eventually opted for the legislative route since the legislature was being summoned for this monsoon session.
The government may not find it difficult to push the law through given its brute majority, but the discussions during the introduction, consideration, and passing stages in the Assembly could give it some anxious moments in justifying its validity, given that most comunidades have already voiced their opposition to the move.
The government, meanwhile, is also expected to push other bills, including one to amend the Factories and Boilers Act, to enhance the ease of doing business, among others.
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Speaker (Im)partial?
Amid speculation that he is tipped to be inducted into the Cabinet, especially after the vacancy created by the sacking of Gaude, the Speaker of the Goa Legislative Assembly, Ramesh Tawadkar, landed in a controversy of sorts with his physical presence at the pre-session meeting of the BJP MLAs and their allies.
Tawadkar may have sought to justify his going to the BJP event in his personal capacity and only for the dinner, not the session strategy meeting of the MLAs, but it could see him face a confrontation with the Opposition in the House, as he often has during the tenure of the current Assembly, over the impropriety of his action and his perceived bias towards the treasury benches.
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What's in it for the Opposition?
The legislature is often the forum that offers the Opposition and individual MLAs the opportunity to grab their 'moments in the sun'. This monsoon session, beginning on Monday, will be no exception, and each of the seven who occupy the Opposition benches — Opposition Leader Yuri Alemao, Carlos Alvares-Ferreira and Altone D'Costa of the Congress, Venzy Viegas and Cruz Silva of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Vijai Sardesai of the Goa Forward Party (GFP), and Viresh Borkar of the Revolutionary Goans Party (RGP) — will all be yearning to grab their chances through the 15 days.
The ongoing controversy surrounding the large-scale conversion of green zones for real estate purposes, especially after court orders junking the ODPs of Calangute-Candolim and Arpora-Parra, alleged corruption in the administration, the cash-for-job scam controversy, and issues of law and order are some areas that the Opposition MLAs are hoping to explore to floor the government.
The stage for the govt vs Opposition is set, and who wins the battle during the monsoon session is a question that will be answered only when it ends on August 8, by the performance of the legislators on either side of the aisle on each of the 15 working days.
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Yuri-Vijay tussle, AAP's divorce from INDIA bloc mar Oppn unity
Despite being a first-timer, Leader of the Opposition Yuri Alemao had demonstrated an appreciable performance, managing to evolve a workable unity among the politically fragmented seven-member Opposition bench, so they could tackle issues and better floor the government in the House despite their poor numerical strength, up until now.
However, on the eve of the upcoming monsoon session of the legislative assembly beginning on Monday, signs that this unity is on the verge of cracking are visible.
Two major developments are coming in the way of the Opposition cementing the workable unity they have cobbled up until now: First, the tussle of sorts brewing between Alemao and Goa Forward Party supremo Vijai Sardesai, and second, the decision taken earlier this week by the Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) to walk out of the INDIA bloc nationally.
The fourth party in the Opposition, the Revolutionary Goans Party (RGP), which has a lone MLA in Viresh Borkar, meanwhile, has often been in and out of the 'united opposition' formation and is likely to remain so.
The tussle between Alemao and Sardesai has been brewing for some months now and seemingly stems from their quest to politically position their respective selves as the leader who will challenge to the BJP in 2027. Interestingly, the timing of the public sparring between the two has coincided with that of reports that back-channel talks are ongoing here and in Delhi for a marriage of convenience between the Congress and the GFP. While neither was willing to publicly comment on the perceived differences, the fact of the matter is that the bad blood is coming in the way of a united front by the Opposition in the House.
In fact, Sardesai raised issues with Alemao's eleventh-hour convening of a joint opposition meeting to discuss strategy for the monsoon session and even skipped the meeting when it was held, altogether.
Another major hiccup for the Opposition to unite in the Goa Assembly during the monsoon session is the decision of AAP at the national level to walk out of the INDIA bloc. The decision was made public on Friday and the party's two legislators -- Venzy Viegas and Cruz Silva -- will have a tight-rope to walk on while co-ordinating with the others in the Opposition. Both Viegas and Silva were the only two non-Congress legislators to attend the Alemao-convened meeting of the Opposition to discuss and strategise for the monsoon session held earlier this week and which Sardesai and Borkar skipped, apparently deliberately.
The show of unity among the Opposition in the House thus far, meanwhile, had always been tentative given its fragmentation on political party lines -- Congress (3, AAP (2) and one each belonging to the GFP and RGP. It will be all the more in peril now and here on as 2027, the date when the next assembly election gradually nears, with each leader and political entity jostling for political constituency with an eye on the all-important electoral battle.
