REVENGE: Luizinho Faleiro betrayed Sonia Gandhi and is now taking revenge on the Congress for not making him the GPCC president.

BY RAJAN NARAYAN

AND a few stray thoughts for yet another Saturday. For a Saturday following the week when the I-PAC was targeting the Congress party. For a Saturday following the week when I just returned from a 10-day stay at my sasural at Goa Medical College & Hospital. For a Saturday following the week when Chief Minister Pramod Sawant was forced to abandon the Bhumiputra Adhikarini Bill 2021. For a Saturday following the week when the Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan continued to be in jail 20 days running.

I-PAC BLEEDS CONGRESS

AND a few stray thoughts on the political strategist Prashant Kishor’s I-PAC (Indian Political Action Committee) targeting the Congress. According to Prashant Kishor the main aim of the I-PAC is to remove the BJP from power in all the states going to polls before the Parliamentary elections in 2024. This includes not only tiny states like Goa and Manipur but also mega states like Uttar Pradesh.
The ultimate objective of the Trinamool Congress is to take on Narendra Modi in the Parliamentary election in 2024. Is the tail wagging the dog or the dog wagging the tail? Is the weakening of the Congress party the aim of the I-PAC or are they following Luizinho Faleiro’s own agenda? It is clear that Luizinho Faleiro now stands exposed following the revelation of Raul Fernandes, the Herald’s owner, that he had been working on behalf of Luizinho Faleiro.
Mamata Banerjee herself has been on record that she would accept the support of the Congress to displace the BJP from the centre. We recall a famous photograph of Mamata-didi with Sonia Gandhi outside her residence. What the I-PAC does not realise is that by seeking to undermine the Congress it is weakening the secular forces.
Even Prashant Kishor would have to admit that the Congress has always been among the most secular parties at the national level. Ironically, Luizinho himself when he was announcing his betrayal of Sonia Gandhi had insisted he was still a Congressman and will always be part of the Congress. The twist he gave was that there were several Congress parties which included the Trinamool Congress of Mamata-didi, the Nationalist Congress of Sharad Pawar and the YSR Congress in Andhra Pradesh.
If Luizinho is still a member of the Congress as a Trinamool Congress leader, why is he busy pouching Congress workers? Which is where the I-PAC evil genius manifests itself. It is projecting unknown, self-styled defectors like Swati Kerkar as big scoops!
Significantly, the I-PAC was not able to get Congressman Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco to defect. On the other hand it helped Reginaldo Lourenco to get due importance in the Congress party as one of the two working presidents. The I-PAC is welcome to take away the kachra from the Congress, the stronger the Congress will become! Luizinho must realised that perhaps like me he too has become a has been. And commands no support even in his own historic constituency Navelim, let alone the rest of Goa.

HANDCUFFED TO CATHETER

AND a few stray thought on my return to work after a 10-day break in the Goa Medical College (GMC) hospital. On Sunday, October 10, the “pump” in my bladder slowed down, affecting the elimination of my liquid waste. The analogy is to the battery of a smart phone! Just as when the battery goes down you cannot make or receive calls or use your phone, when the battery cells in your bladder become weak, it is not able to push out urine.
I suddenly discovered two weeks ago that I was voiding only 20% of the urine while balance 80% remained in my bladder. It felt to alarmingly lower levels on Sunday, October 10 when my bladder went on strike. Alarmed, I rushed to the GMC where I have always received a warm welcome!
This time around it was Dr Rajesh Patil who literally held my hand and assured me that the problem would be sorted out. Dr Rajesh referred me to the Urology department which is headed by Dr Madhu Mohan Prabhudesai, who is now a full-time director of Healthway, Goa’s first co-operative of doctors hospital.

SUSPENSE ON RETURN

FOR me it was ten days of anxious suspense. Whether my bladder will renew functioning normally or go kaput forever. I was put on a catheter which is a long tube pushed into the bladder to drain out accumulated urine in the bladder. The logic I heard was that my bladder was exhausted and I was working it too hard. If I rested it for 10 days or so with the help of the catheter, the natural process would resume.
There are of course no guarantees that one would get back to normal again. Indeed, soon after I was admitted, a good friend dropped by to visit and shared with me that his own father in the 90s had been on a catheter for two years before passing away. I was told by Head of Department of Urology that that I must be willing to live with the catheter for the rest of my life!
And I made it very clear to Dr Lawande, de facto HOD at GMC, that I don’t want to be on a catheter for more than a week. Unless you have been through such an experience you will not believe how crippling it can be. Since the bladder is linked via the catheter to a urine bag, you may not move more than a meter, even if you wanted to go to the washroom you have to carry the urine bag with you.
Only when the distinguished Dr Madhu Mohan came to visit me in one of the isolation rooms attached to the general ward at the GMC that I learned that the decision would be mine. Dr Madhu Mohan whom I have known for a long time told me that the most probable cause could be my bladder “pump” had lost its ability to pump out urine. There were other much more fearful possibilities that a nerve was damaged.
Or the mind which controls all parts of the body has lost control of the bladder. We finally agreed that we will try out the catheter treatment for 10 days. The doctor who was actually treated me was a Dr Rohit, an associate professor from Nagpur. But for the genuine regard and affection of Dr Rajesh Patil and his team of resident doctors, I don’t think I would survived my ten days of rigorous imprisonment. It was like having my body handcuffed to a catheter. I lived in terror of the possibility that I would have to live with a catheter all my life.
I would rather jump off Manohar Parrikar’s Atal Sethu Bridge. Fortunately, for me at the end of the 10 days my bladder pump had got recharged anew. On October 18 the catheter came off and after a lot of anxious suspense for two hours I found my bladder was functioning okay without catheter support. It was sweet liberation for me liberation for me and all promised that I would live long enough to fight the BJP and the TMC if only in the state of Goa!
I returned home on Wednesday, October 20 to working anew. Not that I have ever stopped working in my life, I have always kept working throughout all my illnesses in and out of hospitals and quite a few doctor friends know this now and warn me not to overdo it.

REAL COVID-19 HERO IS DR PATIL

IT is not widely known that it is Dr Rajesh Patil who looked after the main covid-19 centre in Margao for more than a year. It may be recalled that Dr Edwin Gomes, Head of Medicine Department was initially managing the covid-19 crisis hospital centre. After a couple of months Dr Edwin Gomes asked for a break for he was exhausted working continuously for three months, risking his own health and life. Health Minister Vishwajit Rane refused to grant him the long leave Gomes had sought.
Instead Rane sent out a message that nobody is indispensible! So Dr Edwin Gomes went on long leave and Dr Rajesh Patil was promptly told to accept the challenge of running and tackling the covid-19 centre at the peak of the pandemic.
I would like to salute the kind and compassionate Dr Rajesh Patil who worked for an entire year without a single break, till the worst of the pandemic was over in Goa. The interesting part is that Dr Rajesh Patil is a surgeon and not a medical doctor! His patients missed him as a surgeon. Dr Rajesh tells me that being a surgeon is the best job in the world. Imagine having to operate on more than 20 patients in a day. But he says that is all in the mind. You have to transmit to the patient your concern and faith that all will be well.
It was his confidence in me that my bladder would recover and I would live to continue the latest threats in Goan politics and democracy, that worked for me.

BHUMIPUTRA BILL ABANDONED

AND a few stray thoughts on Chief Minister Pramod Sawant being forced to abandon the Bhumiputra Adhikarini Bill. The Bhumiputra bill was aimed at creating a migrant vote bank for the BJP. After all why should only leaders like Babush Monserrate and Digambar Kamat enjoy the support of vote banks?
Under the Bhumiputra bill it was proposed to legalise all land and property migrants into Goa had settled on for more than 30 years illegally. Which is likely to be almost 30% of Goa’s population. Though the BJP likes to do Muslim bashing, the fact is the largest number of migrants in Goa are Hindus from the neighbouring states.
The first wave of migration started after Liberation in 1960 and it was so high that it was 34% of the then population of Goa. The migrants came from Maharashtra and Karnataka to do labour jobs in construction activities and garbage collection for the Corporation of the City of Panaji.
The bill was an attempt by the BJP to selectively reward or create a Hindu vote bank for itself. Just like in Jammu and Kashmir where the BJP is trying to push out Muslim residents in favour of the Kashmiri Pandits who were driven out of their homeland Kashmir. Incidentally, the Nehru family is made up of the descendants of Kashmiri Pandits. Jawaharlal Nehru who was the first prime minister of India was a Kashmiri Pandit. Top jobs were given to Kashmiri Pandits by Nehru.
But in Goa even the late Manohar Parrikar discovered that he could not form the government without the Catholics. The Catholics and the Muslims still constitute almost 30% of the votes and as high as 60% in Salcete. What was shocking is that Parrikar succeeded in his gamble with all the Catholic candidates given BJP tickets to win their seats.
Even in the 2017 elections of the 13 seats that the BJP got, ten went to Catholic candidates. The Bhumiputra bill would have further undermined the unique and distinct identity of Goa. If the bill is passed it would more or less mean merger with Maharashtra and Karnataka through the backdoor.
The BJP government has already diverted the Mhadai river for the benefit of Karnataka’s wasteful water guzzling sugar plantations. The BJP has converted the whole of Goa into a coal mine for the benefit of Gujarati industrialist Gautam Adani. Fortunately, the opposition to the Bhumiputra bill is so strong in Goa that the CM had to bow and withdraw it.
Since the recent assembly session was the last before the assembly elections on the way, there will be no bhumiputra till the new government is formed. Though of course the BJP can always bring an ordinance to implement the bill. But the courts are bound to strike it down as it chooses to reward illegal construction.
The BJP is reeling under the shock of Babush Monserrate threatening to leave the BJP, to which he had defected. By denying Babush tickets for his wife Jennifer and son Rohit, the BJP faces the risk of losing five seats in Tiswadi.
Significantly, the sarpanch of Taleigao, Agnel Fernandes, has resigned and is contesting the St Cruz seat on a BJP ticket

PRASHANT SALAZAR

AND a few stray thoughts on the dangers of corporates organisations directly getting involved in polictics. We all know that the Adanis have been able to turn MPT into a coal hub. Thanks to them the South Western Railway is been double tracked so that more coal can be carried from Goa to Karnataka. The highways are being widened for the same purpose. Luizinho has admitted that his deal was with Prashant Kishor and not with Mamata didi. That the deal was brokered by the Heraldo newspaper owned by Raul Fernandes. I asked Cleofat Coutinho the contitution lawyer what he thought of I-PAC. He pointed out that in this case I-PAC was directly getting involved in Goan polictics. They were selecting candidates and inducing Congress workers to defect. I-PAC which suppose to help didi to become the Prime Minister of India in 2024 needs the support of the Congress and the NCP. Instead it is busy destroying democratic forces and helping the fascist. They are holding a Kharidi yatra in Goa where members are joining them not for Mamata didi because they are being paid. They are become a employment exchange which even Babush did not do. They are worse then Adani and Babush and Salazar.

SHIV SENA DEFENDS ARYAN

AND a last stray thought on Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan continuing to be in jail for 20 days after his arrest on October 2. According to the Narcotic Bureau, Aryan Khan was arrested on a cruise ship entertaining a 72-hours long rave party while cruising to Goa and back to Mumbai.
The NCB claim is that not only had Aryan Khan consumed drugs but was involved in a much larger drug peddling racket. It is widely believed that the arrest of Aryan Khan is an attempt to divert the attention from the discovery of 3,000 kg of hard drugs from Adani’s Mundra port about a month ago. There is a lot of sympathy for Aryan Khan in the country not only amongst fans of father Shah Rukh Khan, but even the Maharashtra state government. A Shiv Sena minister of the Maharashtra government has moved the Supreme Court for grant of immediate bail to Aryan Khan.
The NCB claims that Aryan Khan has promised that after his release from jail he will be a good guy and serve the poor and the humble. This is the “mannat” of Aryan Khan, the son of Shah Rukh Khan.