Vijai Sardesai-led Goa Forward party quits NDA citing CM Sawant's 'rampant corruption, dishonesty'

Dared by local Congress leaders to quit the BJP-led NDA before patching an alliance with the Congress for upcoming municipal polls, Goa Forward, a regional political party on Tuesday passed a unanimous resolution announcing its withdrawal from the ruling pan-India alliance.

In a letter to the chairperson of the National Democratic Alliance and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Goa Forward president Vijai Sardesai said that the decision to quit the alliance was taken in view of corruption and dishonesty of the Chief Minister Pramod Sawant-led government in Goa.

"I write to you today formally declaring the Goa Forward party's withdrawal from the National Democratic Alliance. There is no doubt that our relationship with the NDA ended in July 2019, with no room for reconsideration. So, consistent with our democratic commitments and the will of the people of Goa, we announce the termination of our participation in the NDA," President of the Goa Forward party and former Deputy Chief Minister Vijai Sardesai said in his letter to Shah.

"Since July 2019, the state leadership of the BJP in Goa has turned its back on the people of Goa who looked ahead with hope to the prospect of all-round development of our beloved state. The unfortunate demise of Manohar Parrikar brought Goa to despair while ushering in a period of rampant corruption and dishonesty with the elevation of Pramod Sawant as the 13th CM of Goa," the letter also said.

The Goa Forward party has three MLAs in the state Assembly, all of whom served as ministers in the Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar-led regime till 2019. The party had fought a bitter assembly poll in 2017 on an anti-BJP plank.

All three ministers were sacked from the Cabinet after Pramod Sawant was sworn-in as Chief Minister following Parrikar's death in office in 2019. Goa Forward has since functioned as an opposition party, with Sawant in its crosshairs.

Sardesai, a former deputy Chief Minister, in his letter to Shah has maintained that Sawant lacks the adequate skills to head a government.

"His advent proved highly unfortunate and continues to be detrimental to the lives of common Goans. The unprecedented incompetence and lack of basic skills for governance along with immaturity and apathy, have wreaked havoc with the everyday lives of hardworking Goans and continues to threaten Goa's unique way of life, heritage, environment and livelihood," it added.

Sardesai also said that the Goa government had mishandled the pandemic and claimed that it intended to make Goa a 'coal hub' at the cost of the environment and doing little to safeguard Goa's interest in the ongoing Mahadayi river water dispute with Karnataka.

"Moreover, during the peak of the pandemic, the nation saw how little the BJP government in Goa cared and how incompetent it was in tackling the rising cases, consistently flouting all norms and protocols under the illusion of ‘generating income.’ In just two years, the NDA has miserably failed the people of Goa, under the leadership of the BJP," the letter said.

"Over the past two years, Goans have been witness to the daylight destruction of our Bhagwan Mahaveer Sanctuary and the Mollem National Park which has been sold to industrialists who eagerly hope to make Goa a ‘coal hub’. Goa also saw the unforgivable negligence and shocking inaction of the Chief Minister Pramod Sawant over the diversion of our river Mahadayi The consequence of his incompetence and callousness will be disastrous as mother Mahadayi is the prime source of water to our state," Sardesai said.