PANAJI
Aam Aadmi Party’s Taleigao candidate Cecille Rodrigues has once again found herself at the receiving end of who she calls are BJP trolls seeking to tarnish her image with an image of an old social media post after having performed on board a casino juxtaposed with the party’s current anti-casino stand doing the rounds on social media.
The post titled: “Odd Day: Dance on casinos for money; Even Day: Ask for ban on casinos” has an image of her next to a banner at the Deltin Royale casino titled “My last gig for the day at Deltin Royale… So much fun)”.
The banner says the event, held on the occasion of women’s day on March 8, this year was an ‘interactive dancing session’ which she led.
Speaking to The Goan, Cecille, a dancer, said that there was much ado about nothing.
“The impression they are seeking to create is that I was a ‘nachwali’ regularly dancing on casinos and earning lakhs and lakhs of rupees. The reality is quite different,” Rodrigues, a professional artist said.
She said her performance on board the casino was on the occasion of women’s day, it was an all women event which included her mother who she had taken along.
“I had done six gigs that day and this was the final one. In the image doing the rounds, they have cleverly edited out my mother,” she said adding that she does not have nor did have any standing contract to perform on any casino.
She hit out at her detractors saying that the BJP would go to any extent to diminish anyone opposed to them especially a woman.
“Maybe you should be asking the BJP and the people who are sharing the image whether what they are sharing is correct or not and what are their sources of information,” she said, adding that there is no question of doing shows on casinos in future.
Cecille also received a lot of support on social media. “Her character is attacked no holds barred. She is being discussed like she is a hardcore criminal all because she is the AAP candidate… being an artist she was asked to perform on the casino which she accepted. May be she supported casinos then, maybe she wasn’t aware of the bad effects, or even didn’t go into the intricacies. But she has now willingly accepted the decision of her party and is working towards freeing Goa from this menace,” she said.
Cecille herself, has said that while she has friends working on board the casinos, the negative effects of gambling were doing far worse damage to the State.
“Gambling is not good for Goa. I have many more friends who are affected by the gambling vice and their families destroyed. You have to see the big picture. If the BJP didn’t want casinos why did they renew the licence? Why did they not mandate that transactions on casinos should only be done by credit and debit cards,” she asked.
The AAP took a stand against casinos only around one-and-half month back after they received feedback through their surveys that there was overwhelming public support against them. Her performance on board the casino was before she joined the party much less be named its candidate.
