CONGRESS-NCP WINS 4 SEATS IN GOA; BJP GETS 1
From Frederick Noronha
PANAJI (Goa), June 5: Congress-Nationalist Congress Party alliance won four of the five seats, in results coming in Sunday morning, making probable a Congress return to power after five-and-half years in this state of 1.4 million.
Congress won the seats of Taleigao, Margao and Cumbharjua while its NCP alliance took Benaulim. Poinguinim -- the fifth seat, in extreme southernmost Goa and close to the Karnataka border -- narrowly went to the BJP.
These five seats became vacant after local MLAs, of diverse background, most of whom had defected into the BJP, left the party in a series of political defections since January 2005.
Goa has a 40-seat assembly. It has been under 'suspended animation' with the State placed under President's Rule since March 2005, because no party has a clear majority.
With defections, resignations and disqualifications repeatedly hitting the assembly since the turmoil of January-end this year, the equation has been continually changing in the assembly. But till just a fortnight before elections, both BJP and Congress were almost equally poised with 16+1 in the BJP camp and 15+2 in the Congress.
Now, the election results have tippled the scales in favour of the Congress-NCP alliance.
Results trickling in from early morning stunned the BJP, which ruled Goa from late 2000, after ousting the Congress through a round of defections in 1999, and allowing its ex-Congress dissident allies to rule for a short while.
A pro-Congress wind reached Goa not long after the May 2004 election results at New Delhi. Former BJP strongman and ex-chief minister, Manohar Parrikar, who virtually single-handedly propped up the BJP in Goa, has however determinedly fought off challenges and kept up party morale with a never-say-die attitude.
Both BJP and Congress had claimed they would win the five seats that went in for bye-elections. Claims for forming the government are expected to be made later on Sunday.
ENDS
