Panaji (Goa)

The non-BJP political outfits have began rallying to have the proposed private member resolution demanding to install statue of Dr Jack Sequeira get passed during the upcoming Budget session of the legislative assembly.

Congress which is the main opposition party in the assembly has resolved to move a private member resolution demanding installation of statue of Dr Jack Sequeira, a fatherly figure who spearheaded the movement to save Goa from merging into Maharashtra during historic 1967 Opinion Poll.

Goa Forward Party (GFP) which is the alliance partner with BJP in the State government has indirectly  supported the Congress. “The step taken by Congress to move a resolution in favour of installing the statue of Dr Jack Sequeira in the assembly is welcome in its merit,” party president Vijai Sardesai reacted.

“But at the same time it speaks volumes of the unpardonable apathy that their leaders have shown towards Goan-born leaders and Goa-centric issues despite being in power for decades,” he said taking a dig at Congress party.

“It was not about moving resolutions and doing lip sympathy to the cause but to actually ensure that the statue was erected, for which Goa Forward Party would move every possible forum and convince one and all for the same,” Sardesai said.

Nationalist Congress party (NCP), which has a representation in the form of its lone legislator on the floor of the House, has supported Congress.

NCP Goa Unit President Jose Philip D’Souza said that the party will support Congress in its resolution.

“It has been a long pending issue that we need to finally settle. The statue of Dr Jack Sequeira has to be erected in the assembly complex,” he said.

The demand of installing the statue was put forth by Goa Forward Party on January 16, this year, when it celebrated Opinion Poll day through various events. BJP, however, had expressed its opposition stating that the assembly already has a statue of Goa’s first Chief Minister Dayanand Bandodkar.