Three MLAs were sworn in as ministers in the Cabinet of Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Saturday, completing the appointment of ministers in the state. BJP MLAs Nilkanth Halarnkar, Subhash Phal Dessai and senior Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) legislator Ramkrishna alias Sudin Dhavalikar were sworn in by Governor P S Sreedharan Pillai at the Raj Bhavan.
The induction of the three ministers in the all-male Cabinet comes 12 days after the swearing-in ceremony of Sawant and eight other ministers in a grand ceremony on March 28 held in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The new ministers are yet to be assigned their portfolios.
The inclusion of MGP leader Dhavalikar was opposed by most of the 20 BJP MLAs in the state. The MGP had contested the polls in a pre-poll alliance with the TMC. The BJP had then termed the alliance “unholy”. After the election results were declared on March 10, the MGP – which won two seats – extended “unconditional support” to the BJP, which won 20 of the 40 seats in the Assembly.
The BJP formed the government with the support of the MGP and three Independent MLAs, giving it a majority of 25 in the House. It was the BJP’s central leadership which finally decided on Dhavalikar’s inclusion in the Cabinet.
Phal Dessai, who was earlier elected as the deputy speaker of the Assembly, resigned from the post on Saturday morning before the swearing-in ceremony. The Sanguem MLA is known to be close to Sawant.
Halarnkar, a three-time MLA from Tivim, was among the ten Congress MLAs who defected to the BJP in 2019 in a ‘merger’ of the legislature parties. He and Atanasio ‘Babush’ Monserrate, both of whom got re-elected from the BJP in March, have been made ministers.
The MGP had earlier been a part of the coalition government led by former chief minister Manohar Parrikar. Dhavalikar was made the deputy chief minister after he supported the Sawant government following Parrikar’s death. However, after two of his party colleagues and ten from the Congress defected to the BJP in 2019, giving the saffron party a full majority in the Assembly, Dhavalikar was unceremoniously dropped from the government.
The support of the MGP, a traditional saffron ally with a similar vote bank, would be significant for the BJP in the Lok Sabha elections in 2024.
Ahead of the swearing-in ceremony, speculation was rife that one of the three Independent MLAs who supported the BJP to form the government would be accommodated in the Cabinet.
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