TMC-MGP alliance to fight Goa polls with CM face: Mahua Moitra

The Trinamool Congress (TMC) on Tuesday said it will fight the upcoming Goa assembly elections by projecting a chief ministerial candidate and providing good governance will be its key poll plank in the coastal state.

The Mamata Banerjee-led party has tied up with the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP), Goa's oldest regional outfit, for the polls to the 40-member assembly due in early 2022. We will go to the elections with a chief ministerial face, party MP Mahua Moitra, who is also TMC's Goa in-charge, told reporters in South Goa. She was addressing a press conference along with the party's Rajya Sabha MP Sushmita Dev and local leader Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco, who recently joined the TMC after quitting the Congress. Moitra said the TMC's candidate for the top post in Goa will be announced after taking alliance partners into confidence. The Lok Sabha MP from West Bengal hit out at the ruling BJP and accused it of sowing communal discord. This is not just a political fight (with the BJP) but also a moral fight, she said, adding the BJP has been creating communal disharmony in the country which is reflected in recent incidents like disruption of Christmas celebrations in Karnataka allegedly by right-wing activists and action against the Missionaries of Charity. Speaking at the press meet, Dev said she and Lourenco were in the same party (Congress) earlier, but left because it showed no intent to fight the BJP. She said the TMC has come to Goa to do politics of good governance.