Curtorim MLA Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco calls his win a ‘miracle’, thanks Curtorkars for standing by him

MARGAO: Thanking his constituents, the residents of Curtorim or Curtorkars, for standing by him, MLA Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco described his win at the recently concluded Assembly Polls as a “miracle”.

And a miracle it definitely was! In spite of the fact that Lourenco had worked hard for his people over the years and was seen at all citizen protests across the state over the last 2-3 years, he was pitted against two strong opponents – one from the BJP and other other from the Congress.

Curtorim, which was till last month a Congress bastion, can now be called a ‘Reginald stronghold’ after his ‘surprising’ victory, which has left several top Congress leaders in Goa hiding their faces in shame.

After the monumental blunder of joining the Trinamool Congress (TMC), even though he was given a Congress ticket – a decision which Lourenco himself admitted was taken in ‘undue haste without consulting his friends and voters’, he quit the TMC in a huff, less than a month after joining the party, realizing that Curtorkars did not want him to be with an ‘outsider’ party.

He publicly sought forgiveness from his voters for the ‘short fling with the Bengalis’, but while Curtorkars forgave him – as is now apparent from the poll results – he got over 8000 votes, the Congress leaders in Goa, particularly Digambar Kamat and State President Girish Chodankar were in no mood to forgive him.

While newly-joined Calangute bigwig Michael Lobo tried to cajole Congress leaders to take him back, Chodankar and Kamat put their foot down, claiming that he was not welcome anymore in the party.

Not just that, Congress sitting MP from South Goa, who hails from Curtorim, Francisco Sardinha also campaigned aggressively for the Congress in the constituency, attempting to rip apart Lourenco as an independent candidate.

After battling the combined might of the Congress, BJP, TMC, Revolutionary Goans Party and the Aam Aadmi Party in Curtorim, all of whom were hell-bent on sending Lourenco home, he still emerged victorious; and as one Curtorkar today quipped – someone in the heavens must really love Amcho Reginaldo.

We will soon see Reginaldo in the Assembly once again, but this time he may be part of the treasury benches…