Goa Polls: Congress and TMC could agree on a seat sharing pact to take on BJP

NEW DELHI: Speculation is rife at the AICC headquarters in Delhi, that Madam (Congress President Sonia Gandhi) and Didi (All India Trinamool Congress boss Mamta Banerjee) could work out a mutual seat sharing pact or formula between the TMC and the Congress for the upcoming Goa State Assembly elections to be held in February next year to keep the BJP at bay.

Since both the Congress and the TMC want to take on the BJP and ensure its downfall in Goa, commonsense suggests that they should join hands together. If the Congress and the TMC try to take on the BJP separately or individually, it would only help the BJP in the long run and Mamata Banerjee and Sonia Gandhi are both smart enough to understand this.

Besides, the Congress does not have the huge war chests the BJP has and would be happy to share poll expenses with the TMC or only focus on constituencies where it has a strong base. The Congress and the TMC are not exactly enemies and both Sonia Gandhi and Mamata Banerjee have met one-to-one several times in the past.

When it comes to the Congress high command in Delhi, the TMC is not exactly the Aam Aadmi Party or AAP, which while claiming to take on the BJP head-on, is equally hell-bent on decimating the Congress in Goa.

The movement of former Mahila Congress chief Sushmita Dev to the TMC, could also be a quid pro quo of sorts between the two parties. Similarly in the case of the rumored switching of Luizinho Faleiro to the TMC Goa unit. Sushmita Dev was close to Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi and it’s unlikely they would just let her go ‘just like that’, unless there was some secret understanding with Didi.

Now Didi is not exactly the BJP or Amit Shah for the Gandhi family, there is definitely a larger “nationwide strategy” at play. The same appears in the case of Luizinho Faleiro who is also reportedly close to the Gandhi family. Such ‘family friends’ would not be just leaving to join another party, unless it was ‘family business’.

Now one may wonder why the Congress has not yet aligned or announced an alliance with Sharad Pawar’s NCP (Nationalist Congress Party) in Goa. There are multiple reasons for this. The Goa NCP leadership was “sitting on the fence” the last few years, with lone NCP MLA Churchill Alemao openly flirting and supporting the BJP “for development”.

Secondly, many Congress turncoats who also went over to the BJP “for development”, could seek a backdoor entry into the Congress-led alliance, via the NCP, which in turn may not be “mentality strong enough” to say no to sitting MLAs, who have chances of winning once again if they are part of the Congress alliance.

Barring Alemao, the NCP in Goa does not have any ‘very strong candidates’ for the Congress high command to be impressed. In all probability, a Congress-NCP alliance will take place, but at a later stage, making it too late and difficult for the turncoats to come back to the NCP.

Coming back to a Congress-TMC alliance, it’s just the thing Sonia Gandhi and Mamata Banerjee should do, for it’s a win-win situation for everyone. Congress loyalists like Faleiro who are allegedly “not happy” with the present State leadership, can go over to the TMC, and yet be part of the grand alliance, eventually fighting the common enemy – the BJP, without splitting secular votes.

One question still remains! Which party gets the CM’s post? That’s simple, the party with more MLAs.

The CM issue can always be addressed after the results are out. After what happened in Maharashtra, with both the Congress and NCP agreeing to share power with the Shiv Sena to keep the BJP away, it shouldn’t be very difficult for the TMC, NCP and Congress to have a similar arrangement in Goa. The Shiv Sena may join in, if any of their candidates wins.

Even if the TMC and the Congress fight the Goa polls independently (which they definitely shouldn’t), at least on the face of it, (but definitely not as enemies), they can always always come together to form the government later on. The Congress and TMC can be frenenemies, but being real enemies or rivals will only destroy both parties in Goa, benefitting the AAP and BJP greatly.

However, if the Congress and the TMC fight the upcoming elections as real opponents or enemies, they both deserve to lose and the BJP deserves to win!

(The views expressed in this article are that of the author alone and are not necessarily shared in toto by the Editorial Team of IndyaTv.in)