For the Congress, which lost power in the March 3 elections to the state
assembly, nothing appears to be going properly to ensure its revival, so much
so that it could not find a suitable candidate who could take on the ruling
Bharatiya Janata Party candidate, Ms Alina Saldanha, at the Cortalim
by-election, thereby giving the ruling party nominee a cakewalk.
The party lost a candidate as its leaders took long time to decide on the offer
of the person who could have posed serious challenge to the BJP candidate.
Secondly, the party high command refused to accept the selection of Mr
Churchill Alemao and instead decided to nominate Mr Raymond D’Sa, who withdrew
his nomination, scuttling the Congress party’s “game plan” for its revival.
Besides, a probable tie-up with the Goa Vikas Party broke down over the choice
of a particular candidate. The Congress party’s woes were further compounded by
the disunity in the organisational set-up as well as the legislature wing
following which the party could not arrive at consensus at time.
The sources in the Congress said that party’s “revival” plans were being
scuttled by its own people, who probably want a shield from the Chief Minister,
Mr Manohar Parrikar, to cover up their misdeeds while in power and were going
all-out to please him by leaking the inside information of the party decisions
and what the Congress leaders have been talking in closed-door meetings.
According to the top placed sources in the Congress, since the by-election for
the Cortalim seat were crucial as they could have helped it reverse the
downward slide, the pradesh election committee of the party had zeroed in on a
candidate who was associated with some other party but had expressed desire to
join the Congress and contest as its candidate.
The sources said the prospective candidate had agreed to contest the
by-election provided the Congress agreed to pay `60 lakh loan that the
candidate had incurred on previous elections and the matter was then placed in
the hands Congress leadership to decide on the “offer”.
The sources further said that before the Congress could decide on the news
reached ruling-combine and some influential persons not only agreed to pay the
loan amount but also offered a free overseas trip to ward off any chances of
encountering any problem from the candidate at the by-election. The person is
reported to have been offered chairpersonship of a corporation.
The PEC had favoured Mr Churchill Alemao as the Congress nominee, who had begun
moving in the constituency to seek votes and had “managed” to win over some of
the prominent leaders, informed the sources adding that for the reasons best
known to the high command the selection was rejected and Mr D’Sa was nominated
to contest the by-election.
The decision to deny ticket of Mr Alemao left him sulking and has widened the
rift within the Congress at a time when unity in the party was of utmost
importance, said the sources adding that the party would not be able to
implement its revival plans if disunity, which was prevalent at the moment,
continued in days ahead.
The grand revival plans fell flat as Mr D’Sa allegedly “succumbed” to the
pressure tactics of the ruling side as well as offers of suitable
“rehabilitation”. His decision to withdraw was facilitated by some of the
Congress insiders, who were hell-bent on teaching the party a lesson for
ignoring them.
The position of the Congress was so pathetic that it could not also find a
suitable candidate as a dummy candidate and the “chosen” dummy candidate failed
to produce required documents needed during filing of nominations.
