PANJIM: Stating that the Home Minister, Mr Ravi Naik has turned senile and making irresponsible and irrelevant statements to hide his failure in maintaining law and order situation in the state, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday demanded immediate resignation of the Home Minister for his ‘baseless allegations’ that one Roy Fernandes was in the drug business, during the BJP regime in the state, with the blessings of the then chief minister, Mr Manohar Parrikar and his MLAs.
The spokesperson of the state BJP unit, Mr Rajendra Arlekar told a press conference in the city that if the Home Minister, as per his claims, has evidence in the matter, he should not have approached the media but ordered immediate action against Mr Parrikar, and arrested him at the earliest.
“With evidence against Mr Parrikar in hand, the Home Minister should know that there is no point in taking press conferences,” he observed, pointing out that Mr Naik is almost acting like a leader of the opposition, forgetting that he has entire police machinery at his disposal.
Maintaining that all the allegations made by the Home Minister against the leader the opposition are vague, the state BJP spokesperson said the BJP has serious doubts about the capacity and capability of Mr Naik in handling the law and order situation in the state. “In fact, the BJP has been demanding right from the beginning that the government should come clean on the drug trade issue,” he reminded, quipping that the police should take action against any Roy, against whom they have collected evidence.
Mr Arlekar also said the opposition party would bring up the drug trade issue in the House, during the winter session of the Goa assembly, which starts on January 31. “As regards the statement made by the Home Minister about handing over the alleged drug peddler-police nexus case to the Central Bureau of Investigations, he along with the Chief Minister, Mr Digambar Kamat, is fooling the public,” he stated, lamenting that the name of the Chief Secretary, Mr S K Srivastava is also being dragged in the matter.
Countering the allegation of the Home Minister that a person with surname Vaigankar and based in Arambol, who was involved in drug cases, receives protection from the BJP, Mr Arlekar said that no Vaigankar from Arambol is a member of the BJP. “The fact that the Home Minister has no idea about the first name of this Vaigankar, speaks volumes about the investigating capability of the state police,” he retorted.
The BJP took strong objection to the recent statement made by the two Congress MPs, Mr Francisco Sardinha and Mr Shantaram Naik as regards Goans having long suffered for not questioning the Indian Navy over its occupation of the Dabolim airport.
Reacting to the statement, Mr Arlekar said that Indian armed forces, including the Indian Navy, are the protectors of our nation, and the BJP has highest regard for them. “It is a shame that our two MPs are stooping to such a level and condemning the Indian Navy for something like acquisition of two islands off the coast of Mormugao,” he observed, pointing out that security of India has become paramount after the 26/11 attacks on Mumbai, and every Indian, ever political party should support the Indian armed forces in their endeavour to protect the country.
The naval authorities are proposing to acquire Bimbvel beach and two St George Islands off the Mormugao coast by invoking the urgency clause under Section 17 of the Land Acquisition Act 1984.
The state BJP spokesperson further criticised the two Congress MPs for giving religious and political colour to the entire issue of proposed land acquisition by the Indian Navy. “The observation made by the two parliamentarians that the act by the Indian Navy is anti-Christian, is highly deprecating,” he concluded.
I am sure all of Goa would like to see this hairless monkey resign.
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