BJP candidate, Shripad Yesso Naik, is seen leading in North Goa while Congress' candidate, Cosme Francisco Caitano Sardinha, is racing ahead in South Goa. Congress' win in the constituency means that BJP will be losing Panaji, the assembly constituency that belonged to the late BJP MP, Manoj Parrikar.
Times Now VMR and C-Voter exit polls predicted that Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will win one seat each — North Goa and South Goa — while India Today My Axis expects a repeat of the 2014 Lok Sabha Election with a landslide victory for the BJP in both constituencies.
- The election results in Goa will be a close call between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Congress.
- The vote share predictions across exit polls vary between the parties winning one constituency each or a landslide victory for the BJP.
- Congress has hit back saying that exit polls don’t account for the ‘silent voter’ and should be banned altogether.
- BJP claims that the exit polls are a sign of voter confidence in India’s incumbent Prime Minister, Narendra Modi.
Goa could have been anybody’s game as
every exit poll has a different opinion on how the vote share is going to swing during the Lok Sabha Election for the state.
Trajana D’Mello, the Goa Congress spokesperson, asserted that exit polls don’t account for ‘silent voters’ in response to the exit polls that predicted a win for the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).
The silent voter does not speak to the pollsters. It is the silent voters' voice which will change the results predicted by the exit polls in our favour.
Goa Congress spokesperson, Trajana D’Mello, told IANS
The Congress leader in Goa, Chandrakant Kavlekar, even demanded a ban on exit polls altogether as they ‘willfully misguided voters’.
Some exit polls, that fail over and over again, are used to misguide people. May be they want to plant a doubt in people's minds. Exit polls need to be based on facts.
Goa Congress leader, Chandrakan Kavlekar, at a press conference in Goa
BJP’s Goa President Vinay Tendulkar, on the other hand, stated that exit polls which predicted a win for the NDA were a sign of voter confidence in India’s incumbent Prime Minister, Narendra Modi.
This is a vote for Modiji's leadership. He has made India and Indians proud of themselves and the exit poll predictions are an indication of how the voters appreciate this.
BJP Goa President, Vinay Tendulkar, at a press conference in Goa after exit polls were announced.
In North Goa, the competition is between BJP’s incumbent Pad Yasso Naik versus Congress’ Girish Chodankar and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)’s Pradeep Padgaonkar. In South Goa, BJP’s Narendra Keshav Sawaikar is looking for second terms while fielding off Francisco Sardinha from Congress and Elvis Gomes from AAP.
The biggest threat to BJP’s comeback is the state’s mining issue. The Indian Supreme Court has had to shut down many mines over the past five years owing to the environmental endangerment.
Jobs and production have come to a stand still as the mining industry and the Indian government have been locked in a stalemate on the issue.
Goan mining lobbies aren’t happy and suspect that the BJP isn’t reinstating mining rights because it wants to sell the resources to larger companies like Jindal or Adani; harshly affecting the income of around 300,000 people in the state.
The North Goa Congress candidate, Girish Chodankar, is promising to bring about sustainable mining so that livelihoods aren’t affected by any bans on mining.
Narendra Sawaikar, the incumbent BJP candidate from South Goa, has an opposing opinion that the people in the mining belts will stand by the party.
The recent drop in revenue —
as much as 40% — from the tourism industry doesn’t play in BJP’s favour either.
Both industries are the primary sources of employment in the state.
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