Sandesh Prabhudesai
13 December 1999
Instability is the word that haunts now the 20-day old coalition government in Goa. In fact the partners in the Francisco Sardinha-led government are making all attempts to keep it stable.
Sharad Pawar, president of the Nationalist Congress Party, has gone to the extent of appealing to even his old friends in the Congress (now in the opposition here) not to destabilise the BJP-supported coalition government.
The BJP, on the other hand, has applied in the high court to withdraw the year-old case related to multi-crore power rebate scandal against Mauvin Godinho, who is now the minister in the new coalition government.
These developments have taken place amidst rumours making round in the political circles that Ravi Naik, the newly elected CLP leader, is trying to topple the coalition government by trying to woo his colleagues, who had recently split from the Congress to topple the Luizinho Faleiro government within five months.
Informing about the appeal made by Pawar, Dr Wilfred de Souza, the local NCP leader, says Goa requires stability to reverse the image the tourist state has gained all over that no government can last here.
Pawar was in Goa for the last two days and even celebrated his birthday here at Cidade de Goa. After having a meeting with his local party colleagues, he left today morning. Dr de Souza, the sole NCP legislator, has supported the coalition government from outside.
Though he expresses ignorance over attempts being made to destabilise the government, he now feels that part attention of the ruling politicians gets wasted in combating such attempts thereby hampering the developmental works.
BJP leader Manohar Parrikar, who has not accepted any cabinet berth, on the other hand has admitted that he has applied to withdraw the case related to power rebate in order to keep the coalition government stable.
Exposing a major power rebate scandal that had cost the public exchequer crores of rupees during the erstwhile regime of Godinho as the power minister, Parrikar had succeeded in damaging the Congress image to quite an extent while also helping his party to emerge as a principal opposition during June Assembly polls.
"I have applied to withdraw it since my plea related to the issue of rebate has already been accepted by the high court while the Supreme Court is also seized of the entire controversy", he says. He has however requested the court of liberty to challenge the basic issue of rebate once again if the Supreme Court reverses the earlier order.
Calling this government a less evil than the erstwhile Faleiro government, Parrikar justifies his action as a sacrifice made to maintain stability in the government. "Corrupt politicians are ultimately punished in the peoples' court", he says as his plea to investigate the rebate scandal and punish the guilty may be withdrawn if the court agrees to it.
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