Goa Poll 2022: As BJP leaves out Manohar Parrikar's son, Kejriwal says he's welcome to join AAP

Panaji (Goa): On Thursday (January 20), BJP announced the list of 34 candidates for Goa and the name of Utpal Parrikar - former CM and popular BJP leader late Manohar Parrikar's son - was not on the list. 

Reacting to the news, Aam Aadmi Party chief and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, posted on social media, "Goans feel v sad that BJP has adopted use and throw policy even with Parrikar family. I have always respected Manohar Parrikar ji. Utpal ji is welcome to join and fight elections on AAP ticket. (sic)"

Manohar Parrikar has been the former chief minister of Goa and passed away because of pancreatic cancer while being in office as Chief Minister. BJP has fielded Babush Monserrate from Panjim, which happened to be Manohar Parrikar's constituency for nearly 25 years.

Responding to a query about the decision not to field Utpal from Panjim, BJP Goa State election in-charge Devendra Fadnavis said, "For our party, the Parrikar family is always our family. But the seat that Utpal wanted to contest from, we already have a sitting MLA and it would not be fair to drop the sitting MLA. However, we had given him the option of contesting from two other seats and the talks are progressing in that direction."

Sources close to the Parrikar family, aware of the developments, told ANI that for Utpal Parrikar it has become more of a sentimental and emotional issue to contest from the seat where his late father was an MLA. Even if some members from the family convince Utpal to go ahead and contest from some other constituency that BJP is offering him, it is pretty certain that Utpal will not budge.

It is also being told by reliable sources to ANI that over the last one month also several top leaders of the BJP including party president JP Nadda and Home Minister Amit Shah as well as Devendra Fadnavis have established contacts and spoken to Utpal to convince him but the response from him has not been affirmative. 

"We have spoken to Utpal and told him that we will put his political career alive and that he should contest from the seat that we are offering where he would be in a position to win and just in case if nothing works party will not dump him."

Meanwhile, a Member of Parliament from the Rajya Sabha in the Shiv Sena Sanjay Raut had put out a very cryptic tweet a couple of days ago seeking support for Utpal from all opposition parties to support his candidature if he contests as an independent candidate in Panaji.

Also Read: Amit Palekar is AAP's CM candidate in Goa

While so far Utpal has not come out in the public about his decision to contest independently, the wait is still on, as BJP has kept candidature pending on six seats out of which one has been the one that the party had offered to junior Parrikar. And now with Kejriwal's comments, the matter might have just gotten more interesting.

Goa will go to the assembly polls on February 14. The counting of votes will take place on March 10.

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