Congress demands full-time CM for Goa

Panaji, May 12 (IANS) A day ahead of BJP President Amit Shah's visit to Goa, the Congress on Saturday demanded he immediately appoint a new Chief Minister to replace an ailing Manohar Parrikar.

Parrikar is undergoing advanced treatment for pancreatic cancer in a US hospital.

Former Union Minister of State for Law and senior Congress leader Ramakant Khalap also said the Congress would petition the Panaji bench of the Bombay High Court challenging the constitutionality of the three-member minister advisory Committee appointed by Parrikar to administer the state in his absence.

"We are demanding from Shah to give the state a full-time Chief Minister, in place of Parrikar. In 2017, we got the people's mandate to form government but Shah usurped it from us," Khalap told reporters in presence of Goa Congress President Girish Chodankar. 

"The state has no fully functional Chief Minister and the BJP does not even bother to fulfill its responsibility towards that end by giving a full-fledged Chief Minister," Khalap told reporters in presence of state Congress president Girish Chodankar.

Parrikar was shifted to the US in March, a month after he was first admitted for stomach pain, which was subsequently diagnosed as pancreatic cancer.

Khalap also said the Congress would soon file a petition in the High Court bench in Mumbai, challenging the constructional validity of a three-member committee of ministers appointed by Parrikar which includes one minister each from ruling coalition alliance parties and one minister from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

"We hope the High Court bench in Goa will take cognisance of the 'unconstitutional manner' in which the state is being governed," Khalap said.

"There is no provision for three persons to rule a state. The result is chaos in administration. We are challenging the appointment of this committee," the Congress leader added.