NT NETWORK
MAPUSA
Senior BJP leader and Mapusa MLA Francis D’Souza has said that poaching of Congress MLAs was not required for the BJP, as it will amount to ‘additional baggage’ and bring a bad name to the party.
D’Souza was speaking to this daily over phone from USA where he is presently undergoing medical treatment.
He said, “We have got five Congress leaders – Mauvin Godinho, Pandurang Madkaikar, Vishwajit Rane and now Subhash Shirodkar and Dayanand Sopte, what does this show? It shows that we don’t have the capacity to do things on our own. It will affect the party cadre.” The Mapusa MLA further said, “How long will you do it? One or two is okay. We were 13 then 14, 15, 16, now it is ridiculous. All this will affect the party MLAs, who have worked hard to get themselves re-elected, they will suffer.”
Hitting out at the local leadership, D’Souza said, “It is our local leaders who worked and proposed this which was further accepted by the central leaders, who take a final decision which may or may not be in the interest of the party.”
D’Souza said that the BJP core committee comprises of ten members. However, decisions are taken by only three to four members. “I am not around, so they don’t consult me but there are other senior leaders like Laxmikant Parsekar, Rajendra Arlekar, Damodar Naik and Dayanand Mandrekar. They should at least be consulted before taking the decisions. Three-four members are the people taking the decisions,” he said.
The senior BJP leader said that the decision of poaching the two Congress MLAs was taken keeping in mind the forthcoming Lok Sabha election, as the party thinks people will vote for the MLAs, which is not correct. “There is a difference between Lok Sabha election and assembly election and voters are clever now. All voters cannot be ‘bought’. Just because MLA has joined one party, it does not mean that the people will also join,” opined D’Souza.
Commenting on Shirodkar and Sopte joining BJP, he said, “This had been going on since the last one and a half year and I’m not surprised at all. Even people are not surprised. Just to stay in power, how much will the BJP sacrifice?”
Supporting former chief minister and ex-Mandrem MLA Parsekar, D’Souza said, “I feel Parsekar is correct. He should have been consulted before inducting Sopte into the party, as Parsekar is a former chief minister and a two-time state party president.” D’Souza said that in a democracy all stakeholders should be taken into confidence before arriving at any decision. “If this practice is not followed, then the party will go in one direction,” he said.
Stating that his medical treatment ended on October 10, D’Souza said that he will be undergoing a body scan on October 17 after which he will take doctor’s advice and return to Goa by October 22.