Panaji, Oct 24 (NIE): Faultlines in the Goa BJP unit widened Tuesday after state BJP president Vinay Tendulkar accused his colleague and former Goa chief minister, Laxmikant Parsekar of hurling abuses at BJP president Amit Shah and CM Manohar Parrikar.

On the sidelines of a security conclave in Panaji, Tendulkar, when asked about Parsekar’s recent outbursts on a Congress MLA being inducted into the BJP, said: “Avoi-voilean zo odheox galli marta ni, hanv nav uchar korit ni hangasor, mhajer ietle. Avoi voilean galli marlea amchea odheox-ak (One who utters an abuse in the name of the mother… If I say it here, it will reflect badly on me. He has abused our president in the name of his mother).”

“Can one who utters such abuses about our national president be made the chief minister? He abused Manohar-bhai Parrikar, state president (referring to himself) and national president. He asked me to record (the abuse) and to make them listen to it.”

Parsekar denied hurling abuses at Shah and said he had only spoken about Tendulkar. Tension within the party has risen since the state core committee inducted two Congress MLAs last week, including Dayanand Sopte who had defeated Parsekar in the 2017 assembly election from the Mandrem constituency.

The conversation Tendulkar referred to took shape after Parsekar was informed of Sopte being inducted in the party. Two others — Rajendra Aklekar and Dayanand Mandrekar — also from the core committee have expressed regrets on inducting the two Congress MLAs into the BJP.

The BJP cadre in Mandrem and few other constituencies also stand exposed with Sopte asking Parsekar to ask his supporters to vote for him. Parsekar, in an earlier public meeting, expressed anger and admitted that he verbally abused Tendulkar over the phone. “I am not angry. We are boys who have not studied much. He (Parsekar) is highly educated,” said Tendulkar, who according to party sources is among the top contenders for the post of Goa CM.

Parsekar told The Indian Express that the allegations against him were false. “I have not abused Amit Shah or his mother. This is totally false and he is setting up false grounds. The truth is all that I said was exclusively against Tendulkar. He has proved to be inefficient and incompetent state president and he takes decisions which are nothing but diktats given to him by certain select persons behind the curtains,” he said.

“There is no question of me apologising to him. Instead, he has to apologise for backstabbing me, and breaking my trust, even though I am a senior BJP leader. Today, the party in Goa is in a difficult stage as Tendulkar is nothing but a puppet and he has shown no leadership or owned responsibility for his actions.”

Asked if he will support Sopte, he said, “There is no question of any support. This would have been a different situation if all of us were taken into confidence and we were consulted. How do you expect any help if decisions are taken like this and colleagues backstab you? The anger is against the manner in which no one was consulted and Tendulkar being a state president didn’t even convey to us.”

“I have got tremendous support from several karyakartas and the telephones have been ringing. The anger is across. He says he will take his allegations to Delhi. I am saying that the next few days will show the pressure rising against him, from the cadre on the ground. He will be forced to quit himself because the anger is spread across the karyakarta for the manner the decisions have shaped in the last few days.”

Meanwhile, banners also have gone up at Mandrem, where former state RSS chief Subash Velingkar is expected to address a public meet on Wednesday. With Parikkar’s health failing every day, and with Vijai Sardesai going on record that the national leadership is looking for “alternate leadership”, several ministers and MLAs and allies have been making a beeline to Amit Shah’s residence in New Delhi.

In the last few days, Parsekar and a few other members in the core committee have gone on record to say that they were upset with the decision to take Sopte and Congress MLA Subash Shirodkar into the BJP, as they claimed they were kept in the dark.