PANAJI
In the annals of Goa’s political history, few episodes are as contentious and quietly buried as the purported 1991 power-sharing agreement between two former chief ministers “ Ravi Naik whom Goa bid adieu following his passing on Wednesday and Dr Wilfred de Souza “ brokered before former Prime Minister and then Congress president Rajiv Gandhi.
The deal, forged in the backdrop of a fractured Assembly in the wake of the collapse of the Progressive Democratic Front (PDF) government, was a political experiment to stabilise Goa’s polity and simultaneously buttress the Congress. Instead, it became a tale of betrayal and denial following the assassination of Gandhi in May 1991.
The seeds of political instability of the 1990s were sown in the hung assembly mandate of the first post-Statehood, post-language agitation election of 1989 and remain one of the most dramatic chapters in Goa’s history.
The elections yielded a hung mandate: Congress won 20 seats, the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) secured 18, and two Independents held the balance in the 40-member House. However each Independent “ Anant (Babu) Naik and Dr Carmo Pegado “ sided with either blocs, giving Congress a wafer-thin majority of 21 to MGP’s 19.
Congress formed a government with Pratapsing Rane as Chief Minister, but it was short-lived and collapsed within months after a faction of eight MLAs led by Speaker Dr Luis Proto Barbosa broke away to form the Goa People’s Party (GPP). This splinter group allied with the MGP to form the Progressive Democratic Front (PDF) government, with Barbosa as Chief Minister and Ramakant Khalap of the MGP as Deputy CM.
The PDF government too lasted just 11 months, collapsing under the weight of internal discord between GPP and MGP. With the Assembly fractured ” Congress holding 12 MLAs, MGP 18, GPP 8, and two Independents ” no viable coalition could be formed and the Centre “ the Congress propped up government of Prime Minister Chandrashekar “ imposed President’s Rule, suspending the House.
It was in this deadlock that the infamous a power-sharing agreement between Naik and De Souza was brokered and reportedly sealed by Gandhi.
The deal was strategic: Ravi Naik, leading a seven-member faction from the MGP, would split and merge with the Congress which was then led by De Souza. Together, they would form a government with a rotating Chief Ministership ” Naik would serve first, followed by De Souza for the remainder of the Assembly’s term.
The arrangement began to be executed. Naik with six other MLAs split from the MGP and merged with the Congress. President’s Rule was lifted and Congress regained power with Naik as Chief Minister and De Souza as Deputy Chief Minister.
However, the pact was never honoured in full. Following Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination in May 1991, Naik reneged on the agreement, denying its existence and refusing to relinquish the top post.
The betrayal left De Souza smarting and deepened internal rifts within the Congress. De Souza did eventually become Chief Minister in 1993 after proxy legal battles which saw Naik being disqualified for defection under the Xth Schedule of the Constitution by the Goa Bench of the Bombay High Court.
The Naik v/s De Souza rivalry came to define Goa’s politics of those years dotted by the dramatic return of Naik as CM for a brief six days amidst the Constitutional adventurism of the then Governor Bhanu Prakash Singh who unilaterally dismissed De Souza and swore-in Naik. But the week-long drama ended with Singh being summarily sacked by the Centre and De Souza becoming CM again. More than three decades later, all the three political stalwarts involved are no more but the 1991 pact among them, though never formally documented, remains a whispered legend in Goa’s political circles ” a symbol of broken promises and the fragility of handshake politics.
