By Marcellus D’Souza

Mar 25: The Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) decision to support the Pramod Sawant government, which will be sworn in on March 28, continues to be a cause for worry for the BJP.

On Monday, MGP chief Sudin Dhavalikar presented Governor of Goa PS Sreedharan Pillai, in the present of Chief minister–designate Pramod Sawant and other dignitaries including former chief minister of Maharashtra Devendra Fadnavis, his letter of support.

Fadnavis had brokered the deal with the MGP and BJP and termed the relationship as “The two parties were ideologically aligned”.
Nearly all MLAs reached the Chief Minister’s official residence at Altinho in Panjim the same evening to express their displeasure over the decision to accommodate MGP in the ministry.

Later, Ponda MLA and former chief minster Ravi Naik who has led the charge along with Panjim MLA Atanasio 'Babush' Monserrate and 7 other MLAs met for dinner at a Panjim Hotel.

Ravi Naik had first to oppose the tie-up between the BJP and MGP on March 10, the day of the results. He was of the opinion that “with the support of 3 Independent MLAs – Chandrakant Shetye (Bicholim), Alexio Reginado Lourence (Curtorim) and Antonio Vaz (Cortalim), there was no need to take the support of the MGP”. The MGP was perceived as a political rival in the just concluded assembly polls.

Opposing the support extended by the MGP, Atanasio 'Babush' Monserrate had said, ““MGP should not reap benefits of the BJP government and then later start its monkey tricks at the end of the term. I don’t want history to repeat. Let us be a part of one family. You want to be part of the government, then come and merge with BJP”.

Talk that the MGP will be accommodated in the Sawant Cabinet has infuriated BJP cadre.

Sudin Dhavalikar is seen as an opportunist in Goan politics. A six-term member of the Assembly, from Marcaim constituency, Sudin Dhavalikar throughout the campaign vehemently opposed the tie-up between the BJP and MGP. He had always maintained that he “would never support any government led by Pramod Sawant”. “We have witnessed 16 chief ministers in 16 years”, Sudin Dhavalikar had said.
Relations between the BJP and MGP were frayed in 2019, when two MGP legislators joined the BJP overnight. Then how did the MGP and BJP suddenly become the best of bed fellows?
In fact MGPs pre-poll tie-up with the TMC surprised many a political pundit and voter. The traditional voter found it an ‘unsettling experience’ when the Dhavalikar brothers’ decided to enter into a pre-poll alliance with TMC. Voters wondered how the MGP could tie-up with a completely ‘new and untested party from Bengal’ who did not understand the ethos of Goa nor its culture. The MGP has always been positioned itself as a party more saffron than the BJP.

Dhavalikar went into these polls for the first time in two decades without a berth in the cabinet. Is the support given to the Pramod Sawant government because he hankers for a position and is power hungry? Has the MGP emerged as the real kingmakers?

If Sudin Dhavalikar is made Deputy Chief Minister, it will divide the BJP? This could throw a spanner in the wheel. Vishwajit Rane, the health minister in the outgoing cabinet and son of Senior Congress MLA Pratap Singh Rane, who has had an uneasy relationship with Pramod Sawant, could split the party and walk away with Ravi Naik and so called ‘rebels’ to stake their claim separately. How will the ‘dissidents’ be accommodated, will be seen on the day of government formation. It will be the first test Pramod Sawant will have to pass on March 28 to avoid a messy start to his second term.