Keeping Parrikar as Goa CM is cruel: Sena

Mumbai: The Shiv Sena on Tuesday criticised the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s decision to retain Mr Manohar Parrikar as Goa chief minister. The Uddhav Thackeray-led party said the BJP’s decision to continue with the ailing leader as CM was “cruel and inhuman politics”. The BJP is scared the government will collapse if Mr Parrikar is not the CM, it claimed.

The BJP had formed the government in Goa with the support of the Goa Forward Party (GPF), the Maharashtrawadi Gom-atak Party (MGP), the Nationalist Congress Par-ty (NCP) and three independent MLAs. The BJP has 14 seats in the 40-member Assembly, the GFP and the MGP have three each and the NCP has one. There are also three Independent legislators. The Congress, which is the single-largest party in the Goa Assembly, has 16 MLAs.

Mr Parrikar’s poor health has sparked speculation about his continuing as CM. He returned from the US in the first week of September, and just days later was admitted to a hospital in Candolim. On September 15, he was admitted to AIIMS in New Delhi because of a pancreatic ailment. His prolonged absence from office had prompted the Congress to stake a claim to form the government in the state. But BJP president Amit Shah on Sunday stated that Mr Parrikar would remain in office, thus quashing all speculation.

The Congress had even demanded a vote of confidence on the Parrikar government, claiming it had lost the majority in the Assembly. But the BJP has asserted that its government continues to enjoy the support of a majority of the MLAs.

Meanwhile, the Sena claimed that Goa was in a state of “anarchy” in Mr Parrikar’s absence and that the BJP was grappling with the problem of finding a replacement for him. “Mr Parrikar is not in Goa. He is undergoing treatment for cancer at a hospital in Delhi and the state administration is in doldrums in his absence,” the Sena claimed in an editorial in Saamana.

Running the government by retaining Mr Parrikar is not just an injustice to Goa but to him as well. “Forcibly thrusting the post on him is cruel politics,” the editorial said. “Stress is not good for his current condition, but who will explain this to the BJP high command? They are more scared about losing the state than Parrikar’s health. Their motive is that Goa should remain on the winning map of the BJP,” the editorial said.