PANAJI

A Congress led constituency till the last Assembly elections, when voters in this pretty coastal state handed an embarrassing defeat to the party.

It was a Congress led constituency till the last Assembly elections, when voters in this pretty coastal state handed an embarrassing defeat to the Congress party.

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The Congress Party had triumphantly Panjim in the Assembly Election earlier in the year but the BJP, which had made a surprisingly strong showing in the state elections, continued its meteoric rise, gaining both seats from the Congress in 1999. Since then BJP has emerged as a major political party in the state virtually replacing the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP), a local party that had ruled the region in the past years.

While this time round the party in the opposition is back with vengeance to make all the wrongs right this time round. Thus the strategy is to win back the two constituencies of Panjim and Mormugao from the BJP. Whereas on the other hand BJP they will try to retain its hold in the region in which it had opened its account after thirty nine years in the last elections.

In 1999 Sripath Yasso Naik [BJP] won the Panjim seat defeating Ramakant Khalap [INC] by a margin of 36721 votes. Whereas this seat was previously won by Ravi Sitaram Naik (INC) who had defeated Raut Pandurang Dattaram (BJP) by a margin of 417 votes.

The capital has around 900,000 voters who hold the key to the fate of the parties yet again in the forthcoming elections scheduled on 26 April 2004.