Goa: Former BJP Vasco MLA Carlos Almeida Joins Congress Ahead of Polls

Almeida, who was elected to the Assembly from Vasco, became the second sitting BJP legislator to quit after Alina Saldanha.

BJP MLA Carlos Almeida submits his resignation to Secretary of Goa Legislative Assembly Namrata Ulman. (Photo/ANI)

New Delhi: Just a day after resigning from the ruling party and the legislative Assembly the Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) Carlos Almeida on Wednesday joined the Congress in Panaji just a few months before the polls.

Almeida, who was elected to the Assembly from Vasco, became the second sitting BJP legislator to quit after Alina Saldanha, reported PTI.

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"Today, the BJP Vasco MLA has submitted his resignation to Secretary of Goa Legislative Assembly, Namrata Ulman. "I am sad that I have to leave BJP. The party is going one-sided. After Parrikar's death, the party was not going in the right direction," he told ANI on phone.

Almeida joined the party in presence of the All India Congress Committee in charge of Goa Dinesh Gundu Rao, Goa Pradesh Congress Committee President Girish Chodankar and Leader of Opposition Digambar Kamat, among others.

Girish Chodankar said Almeida's entry will strengthen the Congress, which has been seeing desertions by its own MLAs, in Mormugao taluka.

Goan people will never bring the BJP back to power in Goa. Under the BJP government, the state's law and order situation has worsened, the GPCC president claimed. Chodankar said the "wrong" policies of the BJP government were responsible for rising inflation and various scandals.

Kamat said Almeida has taken the right decision by joining the Congress, he added. Although the former MLA had been approached by several other parties.

Polls to the 40-member Goa Assembly are due in early 2022. Goa Assembly has a strength of 40 members out of which BJP currently has 17 legislators and has the support of legislators from Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP), Vijay Sardesai of the Goa Forward Party (GFP), and three independents. GFP and MGP each have three MLAs. Congress, on the other hand, has 15 MLAs in the house.