On Sunday, the BJP party held negotiation meetings with the regional parties and independent parties, wherein they came together to form the government. The Governor and parties elected the Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar as the CM for the state. The Governor of the state Mridula Sinha appointed Parrikar as the CM of the State after he staked a claim and showed supporter of 21 MLAs.
The Governor appointed Parrikar on a floor test and asked him to prove majority support within 15 days of assuming power. His stake in power was cleared by the BJP Parliamentary board. Congress though won the elections with a majority, BJP tied up with the Goa Forward Party (3 MLAs), Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (3 MLAs,) independent Rohan Khaunte and BJP-supported independent Govind Gaude and defeated the Congress party in the State.
Shri @manoharparrikar has been appointed as the CM of Goa. pic.twitter.com/liiUhnvX0e
— भाजपा सम्वाद (@bjpsamvad) March 12, 2017
INC had 17 MLAs in the winning positions and BJP had 13, it was to cover this small margin BJP tied up with allies. Also, Parrikar coming back to Goa meant that the security cabinet will have a vacancy. The replacement of Parrikar as Defence Minister has not yet been decided as per BJP sources.
Speaking to the media, Nitin Gadkari, a BJP leader said, “We have formed the government under a common minimum program to provide stable and to continue development in the State.” Also, this decision was taken as MGP and GFP put forward a condition that they will agree to a coalition only if Parrikar was made the CM. It was necessary to make Parrikar CM as it was the only way to get the allies on board and win a majority. This possibility was also mentioned by Nitin Gadkari during election campaign owing to Laxmi Kant Parsekar’s failure as CM.
GFP was against this alliance but BJP assured of meeting their demands which made it possible. The BJP party agreed to give all three MLAs of GFP a cabinet seat and assured two cabinet seats to MGP. The Independents were also allotted one seat each in the cabinet for this alliance.