PANAJI
A day after Sunday's mutiny in its legislative wing the Congress which charged its senior leaders Digambar Kamat and Michael Lobo of conspiring to engineer defections in cahoots with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), witnessed an uneasy return to normalcy of sorts on Monday as nine of its eleven MLAs attended a late night CLP meeting, ostensibly held to elect a new leader.
Barring Kamat and Lobo, all the other legislators, including the latter's wife Delilah, attended the late night CLP meeting held at the Congress headquarters in the city after the close of proceedings on Day-1 of the monsoon session of the Goa legislative assembly.
There was however no formal announcement on the election of the new CLP leader which was the main agenda of the meeting. It was also not known if a new leader was indeed elected.
AICC emissary Mukul Wasnik, who was rushed to the State to oversee the damage control strategy after Sunday's developments, was part of the deliberations in the late night CLP meeting. Goa desk in-charge Dinesh Gundu Rao was also present.
On Sunday night, the CLP which passed the resolution to remove Lobo as its leader had only five MLAs attending with Nuvem MLA, Aleixo Sequeira, said to be supporting the party but not physically present.
By Monday morning, the party said it had seven MLAs firmly with it as Rajesh Phaldesai joined the delegation which met Speaker Ramesh Tawadkar to seek a change in the seating arrangements in the House.
In the House too there was no trace of the mutinous situation within the Congress' legislature party as all attended and took their seats without any change in the seating arrangements.
Lobo, Kamat and the other three MLAs who had on Sunday seen as having rebelled against the party on Sunday all attended and participated in the assembly proceedings on Monday .
Lobo and Kamat also insisted that they were both still in the Congress.
Kamat, however, said he was "deeply hurt” by Gundu Rao’s remarks against him at Sunday's press conference.
"I am shocked at the statements made by him (Gundu Rao)," Kamat said, adding that rumours of he going to the BJP have been around for the last two terms.
"But I stood firm and led the party from the front in the 2022 elections," Kamat said.
