Sandesh Prabhudesai
16 April 2002
While election notification is expected
any moment, Bharatiya Janata Party chief minister Manohar
Parrikar today dropped one minister and another corporation
chairman, belonging to the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party.
Transport minister Pandurang Raut and Sudin
Dhawalikar, chairman of the Economic Development Corporation,
were the only two former MGP legislators supporting the
BJP government, making it sort-of-a ruling coalition.
At a hurriedly called press conference,
Parrikar admitted that both of them were dropped as they
did not agree to join the BJP in spite of repeated requests
but remained firm on contesting as the MGP men.
Interestingly, Parrikar's action came soon
after Raut filed an affidavit in the high court today morning
that the cabinet had formally not decided on 27 February
to dissolve the Assembly while most of the cabinet members
had opposed the 'proposal' put forward by Parrikar at a
cabinet meeting.
The high court is presently hearing five
different petitions filed by the Congress and the MGP functionaries,
challenging House dissolution as well as lifting funds from
the contingency without presenting the budget. Raut and
other ministers were told to file affidavits in this regard.
Following Assembly dissolution, Raut is
the second minister to be dropped, following dropping of
Sanjay Bandekar, one among the 11 who had split from the
Congress to form the BJP government in October 2000. Jose
Philip D'Souza, another minister and ex-Congressman, had
resigned and gone soon after dissolution.
The BJP, in an unprecedented manner, had
long ago made a public appeal to both the MGP legislators
to join the saffron brigade. As they had not responded,
local party chief Laxmikant Parsekar had recently made a
demand to drop them from the government.
"He used us to form his government and
betrayed by dissolving the Assembly without taking us into
confidence", alleged Raut. His colleague Dhawalikar has
now vowed to expose sinister designs of the BJP during the
poll campaign.
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