Source : INDIA TODAY NEWS
Former Goa chief minister Laxmikant Parsekar has announced his intent to contest the state elections due in early 2027. While Parsekar is eager to return to the ruling BJP and contest from his traditional seat of Mandrem in north Goa, the perceived proximity of local MLA Jit Arolkar to chief minister Dr Pramod Sawant and the BJP could complicate matters.
Arolkar belongs to the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP), an ally of the BJP in Goa.
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Parsekar, a former veteran of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and BJP, was Goa chief minister from 2014 to 2017. The three-term MLA, however, faced a shock defeat at the hands of Dayanand Sopte of the Congress from Mandrem in the 2017 assembly elections.
Sopte switched to the BJP later and contested the by-election from Mandrem in 2019 as a BJP nominee despite the reservations of the Parsekar camp. In 2022, an upset Parsekar left the BJP after the party decided to renominate Sopte from Mandrem for the assembly polls. He contested as an Independent and ended up at number three, but his presence in the fray is thought to have led to Sopte’s defeat at the hands of Arolkar.
Arolkar’s party, the MGP, was then in a pre-poll alliance with the Trinamool Congress (TMC). Parsekar walked away with a section of the core BJP and Sangh Parivar vote, denting Sopte’s chances.
Speaking to INDIA TODAY, Parsekar confirmed his plans of both contesting the elections and rejoining the BJP. “I will join the BJP at the right occasion,” said Parsekar. He claimed that he and Sopte had struck an understanding about either of the two contesting from Mandrem. “This is not a traditional MGP seat. Sopte lost because I fought as an Independent,” he added.
Asked about whether Arolkar was likely to join the BJP, Parsekar refused to comment on whether he would contest as an Independent in that case.
Last year, speaking at a public function, Goa’s transport minister Mauvin Godinho had invited Arolkar to defect to the BJP. This had kicked up a storm, and Godinho was pulled up by the BJP’s state president Damodar ‘Damu’ Naik.
The MGP has two MLAs in the 40-member Goa assembly—power minister Ramakrishna ‘Sudin’ Dhavalikar (Madkai) and Arolkar (Mandrem).
Arolkar is said to have moved closer to the BJP and apparently even expressed willingness to take over as the MGP chief from Dhavalikar’s brother and former minister Pandurang aka Deepak. A former police constable and volleyball player, Arolkar belongs to the Bhandari OBC community, the largest caste grouping in the state.
The MGP is speculated to be eager to strike it out on its own in the assembly elections, which grapevine suggests could be advanced to later this year. It is likely that Dhavalikar may contest from Ponda instead of his seat Madkai, which he has represented for six terms. Deepak may fight from Shiroda, which is held by Subhash Shirodkar of the BJP. Dhavalikar’s son Mithil is seen as the probable candidate from Madkai.
Parsekar comes from a Kshatriya Maratha family affiliated to the MGP, which had a strong base in the Hindu Bahujan samaj, especially in the ‘New Conquests’ region of Goa. Parsekar joined the RSS, and in 1989 was drafted to work for the BJP along with Rajendra Arlekar and Shripad Naik.
At the time, Parsekar and Arlekar were the Pedne and Mormugao taluka karyawahs, respectively, of the RSS. Naik was the sanghachalak of the Tiswadi prant covering Panaji. Around a year-and-half later, they were joined in by the late Manohar Parrikar, the first chief minister of Goa from the BJP.
While Parsekar is a Maratha, Naik is a Bhandari and Arlekar a Dalit. Parrikar, who became the face of the Goa BJP, was a Saraswat. The Saraswats, who comprise both Hindus and Christians, are a small but influential community. These four leaders—an upper-caste Saraswat, Maratha, OBC and Dalit—were part of the social engineering of the BJP in the coastal state. Naik is now a Union minister while Arlekar is the governor of Kerala.
In 1994, the BJP allied with the MGP and four of its legislators were elected, marking its political opening in the state. The four included Parrikar and Naik.
“At the time, working for the BJP was unheard of,” said Parsekar, adding that he had to leave his family home after joining the party. Although he would go home for festivals, he returned to his house only after being elected as MLA for the first term in 2002 by defeating MGP veteran Ramakant ‘Bhai’ Khalap, a former Union minister. Khalap is now with the Congress.
Goa has a place of its own in India’s political history as the first state where a party came to power on a pro-Bahujan samaj plank. In elections held to the Goa, Diu and Daman assembly in 1963, two years after its liberation from Portuguese rule, the Congress, then a monolith in national politics, faced a massive drubbing at the hands of the MGP, at the time led by Dayanand ‘Bhausaheb’ Bandodkar, who became the chief minister. The Congress was being helmed by Purushottam Kakodkar, the father of later-day nuclear physicist Anil Kakodkar.
The MGP had a strong base among Bahujans (or non-Brahmin Hindus) vis–vis the Congress, which was seen as an upper-caste formation. The MGP was opposed by the United Goans Party (UGP), which had support among the Roman Catholic Christians and sections of Hindu upper-castes. Bandodkar hailed from the miniscule but influential Gomantak Maratha samaj.
Goa is also the only state where a referendum was conducted (1967) to decide on whether it should be merged into Maharashtra. The MGP was seeking Goa’s merger while the UGP wanted to maintain Goa’s statehood. Eventually, those against the merger prevailed.
The MGP, which was later led by Bandodkar’s daughter Shashikala Kakodkar, and the UGP underwent a series of splits, and the Congress gradually gained ground. Today, the MGP is led by the Dhavalikar brothers, Brahmins who come from a family of priests at the Mahalaxmi temple at Bandivade. The MGP retains some of its base among the Bahujan Hindus (non-Saraswats and non-Brahmins in Goa), and in seats such as Madkai, Ponda, Shiroda, Priol, Mandrem and Pernem.
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SOURCE :- TIMES OF INDIA
