Ahead of Goa Assembly elections Sena terms BJP as the ‘real beef party’ accusing it of relinquishing Hindutva

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Pune: Kick-starting its election campaigning for the Goa Assembly scheduled in February next year, the Shiv Sena on Wednesday launched a broadside on the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government accusing it of relinquishing ‘Hindutva’ as an ideology and slamming the performance of the Dr Pramod Sawant-led government in Goa. 

In a sarcastic editorial in its party mouthpiece Saamana, the Sena dubbed the BJP as the real beef party in Goa while sarcastically remarking that the saffron party was in effect carrying forward the baneful legacy of Goa’s 450-year -long Portuguese rule with its ‘divide and rule’ politics.  

“The late Manohar Parrikar had established the BJP in Goa by leading the fight against casino gambling. The same BJP government has now become the slave of casino owners while the numbers of youth addicted to narcotic substances in the villages are soaring. While the Prime Minister is upset about the gambling racket, the casinos in Goa help line the pockets of the Goa’s ministers and help fund political parties to fight elections,” said the editorial, mocking Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant’s Sarkar Tumchya Dwari (government at your doorstep) outreach program ahead of the 2022 poll.  

The Sena claimed that ‘Hindutva’ today remained a mere façade for the BJP in Goa, rebuking its estranged saffron partner by arguing that while the law prohibiting cow slaughter was applicable everywhere in the country, any quantity of beef is available in Goa. 

“It is the BJP (in Goa) which has truly become a ‘beef party. If the people of Goa today think that the party is the saviour of the Hindu community, then they are mistaken… their ‘Hindutva’ is just a mask and is evident from the kind of MLAs currently in the BJP,” said the Saamana editorial. 

Criticizing the opportunistic nature of government formation that Goa had been witnessing for the past several years, the Sena said that only the Congress and the regional Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) had true roots amongst the voters of the State, while the BJP seized power by breaking other parties.  

The editorial argued that the MGP, which had a strong claim to be a true ‘Hindutva’ party, lost ground in the State after the death of its stalwart leader Bhausaheb Bandodkar (Goa’s first Chief Minister).  

In the same vein, the edit censured former Chief Minister Luizinho Faleiro, who recently resigned from the Congress to join the Trinamool Congress. 

“Each time before an election, one sees the rise of new parties from which one or two MLAs get elected who then ally with bigger parties…Goa has suffered as a result of such opportunistic politics. The BJP was in the minority after the 2017 assembly election results. But the Congress, which had won the highest number of MLAs (17 in the 40-seat Goa Assembly), delayed its claim to power. In this period, the BJP shrewdly secured a majority by splitting the Goa Congress and engineering defections,” said the Sena, hoping that this picture would change in the upcoming elections. 

Notwithstanding its strident rhetoric against ‘opportunist politics’, the Sena in 2017 had attempted to take on the BJP in the Goa assembly election by forging an alliance with a local party floated by ousted Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) leader Subhash Velingkar. This, even though the Sena was the BJP’s alliance partner in the coalition government in Maharashtra at that time.  

The Sena’s performance had been abysmal at the time, with the party losing heavily on all the three seats (Saligao, Cuncolim and Mormugao) it contested, the party managed a paltry vote share of less than 2% votes. 

Earlier this month, Sena MP and chief spokesman Sanjay Raut, the executive editor of Saamana, had announced that the party would be fielding candidates on 20 to 25 seats and that the Sena was looking at an alliance akin to the ‘Maha Vikas Aghadi’ (MVA) coalition government in Maharashtra.