Former Goa CM hints at defying BJP if not given bypoll ticket
Panaji, Jan 21 : Former Goa chief minister and senior BJP leader Laxmikant Parsekar Monday hinted that he could contest the upcoming Mandrem Assembly bypoll as an Independent candidate if his party refused to give him a ticket.
Mandrem and Shiroda bypolls were necessitated after Dayanand Sopte and Subhash Shirodkar resigned from the Goa Assembly and joined the ruling BJP in October last year.
"I have been traditionally contesting from this constituency. Party workers want me to contest the bypoll. They feel if the BJP does not give me a ticket, then I should stand as an Independent," Parsekar told PTI.
Parsekar said he had met BJP state general secretary Satish Dhond and asked him to carry out a survey to check the party's chances of winning Mandrem seat.
Without naming Sopte, the former CM said local party workers had not accepted the "new person".
Incidentally, Sopte, then with the Congress, had defeated Parsekar in the 2017 Assembly polls.
When contacted, Goa BJP chief Vinay Tendulkar said the process to select a party candidate for Mandrem and Shiroda constituencies had not yet started.
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Women BJP MLAs protest against opposition in UP assembly premises
Lucknow (PTI): Women BJP MLAs held a protest in the Vidhan Bhawan complex before the one-day special session of Uttar Pradesh assembly, slamming the opposition for defeating the passage of a bill, which would have led to implementation of the Women's Reservation Law, in the Lok Sabha.
This followed another demonstration by Samajwadi Party MLAs, who alleged that the BJP was misleading public in the name of women's reservation.
The women BJP legislators assembled in front of Chaudhary Charan Singh's statue in the assembly premises, holding banners inscribed with the slogan "Insult to Matrushakti (women's power), India will not tolerate it". The protesting members entered the main hall of Vidhan Bhawan carrying the banners.
Participating in the protest, the state Minister for Women Welfare and Child Development, Baby Rani Maurya, told reporters that all opposition parties, including the Samajwadi Party and the Congress, had opposed the women's reservation, a stance for which they would have to pay a heavy political price.
"On this issue, all of us women stand united. We will ensure that we secure our reservation," she said.
BJP MLA Ketki Singh remarked that their protest represents the collective outrage of millions of women across the state.
Singh asserted that the opposition has betrayed women by creating hurdles in the path of women's reservation. The current demonstration is merely the beginning, and very soon, women from every street, intersection and household will join the protest movement, she said.
Minister Vijaylakshmi Gautam said, "We strongly condemn the despicable act committed by the Samajwadi Party and the Congress in an attempt to hold back 'half the population' (women). Their action was directed against the very bill that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had introduced to empower and strengthen Nari Shakti (women's power), and which he strived to pass expeditiously."
Uttar Pradesh assembly is holding a one-day special session on Thursday. During the session, the government is set to move a censure motion against the opposition parties over their failure to pass the Constitution Amendment Bill, which would have led to implementation of the Women's Reservation Act, in the Lok Sabha.
