Goa: Former Chief Minister of the state and senior Congress leader MLA Ravi Naik on Tuesday resigned from his MLA post. Ravi Naik who had won the Ponda assembly constituency on a Congress ticket handed over his resignation to Assembly Speaker Rajesh Patnekar.
The resignation of such a senior leader is being considered a major setback for the congress before the upcoming Goa assembly elections. After Patnekar resignation the total tally of Congress MLA's in 40 members-Goa Assembly comes down to three.
Earlier, another former Goa chief minister Luizinho Faleiro also had resigned as Congress MLA in September this year and later joined the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress, which has decided to contest the state polls due early next year.
However, reacting to Patnekar's resignation state Congress chief Girish Chodankar said "the party had "disowned" him long back and he was not even being considered as the party's candidate for the forthcoming state polls."
While submitting his resignation to the governor Naik is accompanied by his two sons who are in BJP. “I have resigned. I will let you know what is the next course of action,” Mr Naik told reporters here after submitting his resignation. It is expected that Naik will also be joining BJP.
Ponda use to be Ravi Naik's traditional constituency. Naik had joined the Congress party in 1991 and in 1994, he became the chief minister of the state. During his tenure in the Congress government, Ravi Naik also served as Minister for Public Works, Animal Husbandry and Conservation, Women and Child Development, Science and Technology.
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