PANAJI: For the second time in a week, chief minister Pramod Sawant latched on to a national issue to draw parallels with Goa and said the tiniest state was also a victim of ‘destructive ideology’.
On Monday, after PM Narendra Modi told the Rajya Sabha that the country needs to be saved from the new FDI (foreign destructive ideology), Sawant tweeted: “Goa has also suffered from a similar design.”
In two tweets, Sawant tried to equate what Modi said about the country with Goa. “The PM Shri @NarendraModi ji has correctly said that we need to be aware of the #andolanjivi and be cautious about the new #FDI. Goa has also suffered from a similar design,” he tweeted.
In a preceding tweet, Sawant quoted Modi and said: “A new FDI has come into the fray. The country has to be saved from this new FDI. This new FDI is Foreign Destructive Ideology: #PMinRajyaSabha.”
Sawant’s latest statements come on the back of largescale agitations taking social media by storm over the three contentious Centre-funded linear projects that cuts across the biodiversity hotspot of Mollem.
The three projects—a 440KV power line, railway double-tracking and widening of national highway—have all tugged at the hearts of students, teachers, citizens, environmentalists and forest officials, who have made representations to the Centre to preserve Goa’s green heart.
But Sawant has vowed to go through with the projects in the face of stiff opposition and said these projects are needed for Goa’s development.
However, last month Sawant had to take an embarrassing decision to scrap the plan to set up the prestigious IIT Goa campus at Melauli after locals did not allow work to start in their village. The state government even tried to work under the cover of police and resorted to lathicharge and firing teargas but had to give in to the local demand.
Four days ago, latching on to the ‘IndiaAgainstPropaganda’ hashtag on Twitter following comments by international personalities on the farmers’ protests, Sawant had said that over the past few months, Goa has become a victim of propaganda which has been significantly fuelled by external forces.
“Some of the opposition parties in Goa have also been motivating such external forces to create unrest in the state. No propaganda shall derail our sincere efforts towards building a progressive state,” Sawant had again tweeted, even as he claimed that some people have sought to catapult the issue surrounding the three projects to the international platform.