“Are Goan Catholics rooting for AAP, ready to give up beef, if AAP came to power,” asks Sagarika Shona Suman?

PANAJI: Model and actress Sagarika Shona Suman, who first exposed the porn racket in Mumbai, ultimately resulting in the arrest of Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty’s husband Raj Kundra, today joined the Goa People’s Forum (GPF) as it’s co-convenor and head of it’s Women’s Cell. She will also be part of the GPF’s media cell.

For several years now, Suman has a home in Siolim in North Goa, and spends months in Goa, particularly during the monsoon, when she is not shooting. Like hundreds of Bomaicars or Bombay Goans, she loves Goa and someday wishes to permanently settle down in the coastal state.

Speaking to this reporter, on phone from Vazem, near Ponda where she is living with relatives, she said: “I was shocked to see the fake propaganda created by certain political parties on the rumored resignation of the Curtorim MLA Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco, a day before his birthday. Posters using the logo and templates of a local channel InGoa News were viral on social media, alleging that the MLA had resigned from his party. Another set of posters claimed the same MLA was to join the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) a day after his birthday. It’s difficult to say which party was publishing these posters, but the finger of suspicion points to the AAP, as only the AAP stands to benefit. I always held Arvind Kejriwal in great respect, he being a former bureaucrat and IITian, but such kind of dirty tricks is just not done. There was a hue and cry created over the last ten days claiming the Curtorim MLA was joining the AAP. Why are you guys so damn desperate? If the Curtorim MLA has to join the party after resigning from his own party, let him do it first and then you guys publicise it. It’s such a shame, the levels to which the AAP is stooping to in Goa.”

Addressing the main minority community in Goa – the Catholic community, Sagarika asked if the AAP would allow Catholics to purchase and consume “beef” in the State without any hindrance. Would it want to upset it’s North-Indian vote bank?

“The AAP main leadership or high command is ingrained in a spirit and culture very alien to that of the State of Goa. The Goemkarponn experience is alien to the AAP high command. In Goa, many Hindu and Catholic women, shoulder to shoulder consume wine and beer, on the beach, at parties and luncheons. If AAP comes to power and forms the government in Goa, Catholics will have to bid goodbye to these salient Goan traits. They will have to bid goodbye to beef steaks and pork sorpotel over a period of time. Goa is probably the only State in the country where beef and pork are openly sold in every market, be it Margao or Panjim. Goans should remember that if they want to retain their Goemkarponn, they should only root and vote for a regional party or one that has already ruled Goa in the past. A known devil is better than an unknown angel,” she quipped.

“To conclude, I would like to challenge the AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal to declare that supply and consumption of “beef and pork” in Goa will never be hampered in any way. Since the AAP is making so many promises to Goemkars, and challenging leaders to debates, let them also promise Goans this,” she said.