BJP woos MGP, wants it to stay away from byelections

PANAJI: Following its successful mission to stop former chief minister Laxmikant Parsekar from contesting as a rebel candidate in Mandrem, BJP has doubled its efforts to prevail upon MGP from contesting Shiroda bypolls.
Sources claimed that MGP leader and PWD minister Ramkrishna (Sudin) Dhavalikar was called to Delhi by BJP on Saturday in what was seen for a meeting with the party’s central leaders for smooth sailing in the April 23 elections, especially for the Shiroda bypoll.
Dhavalikar’s brother and MGP president Pandurang (Deepak) Dhavalikar has announced his candidature for Shiroda bypolls and started his campaign three weeks ago.
BJP election managers are worried about the election prospects if Dhavalikar contests. Sources say that Dhavalikar is gaining ground even in BJP pockets, which is a cause of concern for the saffron party.
MGP, a coalition partner of BJP, has declared that while it will support BJP in the Lok Sabha elections, it will field candidates for the three bypolls—Shiroda, Mandrem and Mapusa.
Five months ago, BJP had got two Congress MLAs—Dayanand Sopte in Mandrem and Subhash Shirodkar in Shiroda—to switch over, reducing the strength of Congress to 14 from 16, making them lose the single largest party tag.
With the death of former deputy CM Francis D’Souza, Congress regained the single largest party tag.