Goa: A majority government's dubious artifice

Had it gone through, the split would have further shaken citizen faith in the electoral process and demoralised Congress for the LS polls

At the end of the failed July 10 attempt to split the opposition Congress legislature party in Goa, the BJP was at pains to distance itself from the affair, claiming it had nothing to do with the internal crisis in the Congress. So what triggered the flurry of developments where opposition Congress legislators came under intense pressure to form a breakaway faction that would eventually merge with the ruling side? Was it the fissures within the ruling BJP itself, the upcoming 2024 Lok Sabha polls or an attempted attack on the Congress's credibility on the eve of an Assembly session where the government was expecting flak for abysmal civic systems?

Congress desk-in-charge Dinesh Gundu Rao said the attempts to split the Congress were aimed at leaving the state with a diminished opposition in keeping with the authoritarian impulses of the ruling national dispensation. Congress spokesman Tulio de Souza said the saffron party was on a national mission across states to break all opposition via defections, especially the Congress. So too with Goa.

Others point out that there's been no let-up to the ongoing tussle, jostling and rivalry between Chief Minister Pramod Sawant and Town and Country Planning Minister Vishwajit Rane ever since the BJP Council of Ministers took the oath of office in March 2022.

Sawant, who clocked 100 days in office recently with a celebration that Rane skipped - is firmly in the saddle and currently enjoys the all-powerful central leadership's support and backing. But steering a ship with more former Congressmen than original BJP members hasn't been easy going - not with Rane constantly hogging the headlines in the overt competition between the two leaders, whose rivalry extends right down to the neighbouring constituencies they both represent.

A BJP minister summed up the shenanigans of the recent failed attempted split and merger by pointing out that there are always legislators pleading to be let through the power-sharing door, no sooner the electoral chips fall. But that holds true for both ruling and opposition career politicians. It is only the limited number of ministries, corporation chairmanships and sundry positions of power to go around that have made it sensible in the Goa power arithmetic to keep the ruling side limited to a maximum of 26 legislators. The BJP currently enjoys the support of 20 of its own MLAs and five more independents and smaller parties - a comfortable tally of 25 on the treasury benches.

So why was there a green signal to induct more legislators from the opposition on July 10, 2022, that would take that number up to 33?

In 2019 - the first time it split the Congress en masse and took in two-thirds of the legislators to skirt the Anti-Defection Law - its numbers rose to 28 in the 40-member house, but its administrative and governance credibility was rock bottom. That 2019 split and merger brought the then newly appointed CM Pramod Sawant a respite from his government's reliance on heavyweight allies like the Goa Forward Party's Vijai Sardessai and more seasoned contenders for the chief ministerial post, like Vishwajit Rane, all of whom were running rings around him. With that infusion, Sawant was able to ride out the remaining three years (2019-2022) of his tenure. Still, the internal tussle in the BJP between Rane and Sawant continues into the current Assembly, as does the rapport between Pramod Sawant and Michael Lobo, the now ousted Congress Leader of Opposition.

Clearly, having settled into power now, the saffron calculation is that a fresh infusion of legislators from the Congress would buttress Sawant's position. Rane already finds himself isolated within the ruling side, in an ecosystem where party diktats are supreme, and most toe the line, even those who might have been dropped to make way for the new entrants from the Congress.

Lobo left the BJP and switched to the Congress on the eve of the February 2022 elections (angering BJP's central leaders) and managed to win three seats for the Congress, including for his wife Delilah and supporter Kedar Naik, giving him considerable heft and a sub-group in Goa's relentless game of thrones, where numbers are key. It wasn't a secret that Lobo had switched sides precisely because the BJP was unwilling to accommodate his wife's candidature and saw his political ambitions in coastal North Goa as a threat.

Though Lobo delivered wins for the Congress in 2022 - splintered votes divided among too many opposition parties (including some propped up by saffron) saw the BJP back in power. Alert to Lobo's potential and the distinct probability of crossovers to the ruling side, the Congress sought to placate him by making him their leader of the opposition, a cabinet-level post, over its senior leader and former chief minister Digambar Kamat. Kamat said he has retired hurt and kept a low profile thereafter, while Lobo initially went about taking up public issues and getting them resolved successfully by Chief Minister Pramod Sawant.

Toppling this applecart, over the past two months, came a slew of enquiries, cases, investigations and charges against Lobo and his businesses in the coastal belt - all from the Town and Planning office and the Food and Drug Administration - both departments under Rane. Lobo said the harassment was political, not personal, while the media speculated if it was payback for leaving his former party and bolstering the Congress in the 2022 polls, which had angered the central leadership.

Pressure or payback, the looming 2024 parliamentary polls and the presidential election are also clearly top of the agenda, even though Goa has a mere two Lok Sabha seats. While the BJP holds the North Goa seat, it is no secret that it is keen, in 2024, to wrest the South Goa seat from the Congress kitty. A weakened Congress strength in South Goa could bring that seat within its grasp.

Local editor Avik Bagle told a news channel discussion that he believed the proposed split was aimed at denting the Congress's credibility in Goa. "The BJP wants a 'Congress mukt Bharat'. The Congress is a party involved with the country's freedom movement. It has credibility. So what BJP is doing is keeping a watch on the developments in the Congress camp and taking advantage of the vulnerabilities of the Congressmen. They are just finishing the Congress' credibility by portraying them as defectors," he said.

Was it a coincidence that the proposed defections and split were timed to take place on Sunday, an auspicious day in the calendar, on the eve of an Assembly session, and rather contemptuously, on the exact date of July 10, when in 2019, a similar two-third split in the Congress had been engineered? Had it gone through, it would have further shaken citizen faith in the electoral process, demoralised the Congress party and discredited it further with its voters, a large chunk of whom stay loyal to the party. Aggressively competitive opposition parties, vying for the Congress space in Goa's politics, were gleefully sharpening their knives at the Congress' misfortunes - indicative of myopia in the opposition line-up and an inability to see the big picture. Their paid news media outlets have gone into Congress-attack mode.

Fortunately for the Congress, an early alert to the plans enabled it to successfully stave off the split by calling its 11 legislators for a series of meetings and press conferences all through Saturday and Sunday, keeping the proposed split under the glare of the media spotlight and leveraging public distaste and opprobrium amidst reminders of the pre-election religious oaths candidates had sworn. It charged the BJP with attempting to throttle democracy with defections, offering legislators Rs 30-40 crore to defect, while Dinesh Gundu Rao charged that coal and mining interests were behind the proposed split and tweeted that the BJP wouldn't stop trying to engineer defections with this foiled attempt at Operation Lotus.

The Congress managed to keep five of its MLAs with it by July 10 evening, making it impossible for the rebel camp to get the 8 MLAs it required to skirt the Anti-Defection Law. A combination of family and voter pressure, and unmet demands from the ruling camp, seems to have stemmed the defections from going through. Having taken a strong stand in denying tickets to defectors in the 2022 poll, the Congress leadership kept up its no-nonsense demeanour - accused Kamat and Lobo of hatching a conspiracy with the BJP and used strong language to come down on the duo. With uncharacteristic agility, on Monday afternoon, it pro-actively moved disqualification applications against Lobo and Kamat for anti-party activities, thereby sending a strong message. By Monday evening, the rebels and their cohorts were backtracking. Chief Minister Sawant said the BJP had enough numbers on its side, while a party spokesperson was at pains to state that the BJP had no hand in the internal goings-on of the Congress Legislature Party.

Though Lobo was removed as its Leader of Opposition, he has said he is with the Congress party. Kamat - the seasoned politician and multi-term MLA who served as the minister of mines under both the BJP and Congress dispensations and was Congress chief minister from 2007-2012, has remained aloof, but made his point in repeated interviews, denied he indulged in any anti-party activity and expressed hurt at the accusations.

In going ahead with the disqualification petitions against Kamat and Lobo, now admitted by the Speaker, the Congress seems to have signalled there was still a trust deficit, that it was taking no chances, that leniency with truant legislators was a thing of the past, thereby sending a warning to its other MLAs and that retaining credibility and voter trust was its priority.

(Pamela D'Mello is a journalist based in Goa)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.