Goa parties spar over action on ‘weaponisation’ remark

Panaji, May 14 (IANS) A war of words broke out between the Congress and Goa's ruling coalition partner Goa Forward on Tuesday after a Youth Congress leader urged the Election Commission to book Deputy Chief Minister Vijai Sardesai for sedition over his recent speech urging "weaponisation" of youngsters.

Goa Forward General Secretary Mohandas Lolyekar questioned the attempts of the Congress to book his party President, Sardesai, for sedition, especially when the party's manifesto for the 2019 general elections promise abolition of the British era law.

"Our party President Vijai Sardesai was speaking in the interest of Goan youth who were not getting jobs. The Congress should have supported us, but instead they want him booked under a British law, which the party's national manifesto claims should be done away with. That is a contradiction," he told reporters here.

On Monday, in his complaint to the EC, North Goa Youth Congress President Vivek D'Silva said that Sardesai's comments made during the inauguration of his party's office here "clearly showed an intent to wage war against a government duly instituted under the Constitution, and also against the people of Goa".

Sardesai on May 7 had said, that he would weaponise Goan youth if domicile provisions for obtaining jobs in government and semi-government bodies were diluted.

Earlier on Tuesday, state Congress President Girish Chodankar said that he had not "checked the complaint" filed by the Youth Congress official yet, when asked to explain the contradiction between Congress' promise about doing away with the controversial sedition law and his party official's complaint seeking an FIR against Sardesai for sedition.

"Definitely, we are against sedition charges. Britishers used that law to suppress the Indian freedom movement. Congress never felt that law can be misused. When the BJP came to power, they started misusing the law against its own citizens, students and journalists," he added.