With exit polls yet again predicting a fractured mandate for Goa on counting day on March 10, independent candidates and regional parties like the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) are likely to hold the key to government formation.
From confident claims of being able to secure the magic figure of 21 (of the 40 Assembly seats in Goa) on their own, the two biggest players in the poll fray - the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress – have now toned down their pre-poll rhetoric to begin hectic parleying with the smaller parties.
Sources within the Goa Congress leadership have said that the party was exploring post-poll alliance talks with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the Trinamool Congress (TMC) and its Goa ally, the MGP, with both Congress election in-charge P. Chidambaram and party desk in-charge Dinesh Gundu Rao expressing the party’s willingness to work with non-BJP parties in the post-poll scenario.
