Rajendra Arlekar, Laxmikant Parsekar, Francis D’Souza & Sripad Naik in the run for Goa's next CM

BHUBANESHWAR: A meeting of the Goa BJP legislature party is likely to choose the successor to chief minister Manohar Parrikar on Friday. Assembly Speaker Rajendra Arlekar and health minister Laxmikant Parsekar were frontrunners in the race. Like Parrikar, both enjoy the support of RSS. Also in the running are deputy CM Francis D’Souza and tourism minister in the Modi government, Sripad Naik.

Naik who carries with him the support of the Bhandaris, Goa’s largest community, must vacate his parliamentary seat if he decides to become CM and get himself elected as an MLA. Parrikar, will have to do vice-versa. “I have just been informed that the BJP legislature party will be meeting tomorrow. As Speaker of the assembly I will not be part of the meeting,” Arlekar told ET.

“The nation’s gain will be Goa’s loss. There is the mining issue, but also Mopa (a second international greenfield airport in north Goa), and the regional plan that would decide land-use pattern among issues that remain to be resolved,” a leading industrialist whose mines like everyone else’s have been shut since October 2012 told ET on Parrikar’s elevation.

Nearly a fourth of Goa’s revenues came from iron ore mining that was halted after a commission claimed serious irregularities. Parrikar, a metallurgist by education, has spend time and energy tackling mining issues — from the time he headed the Public Accounts Committee that implicated the former Congress CM Digambar Kamat and through his own tenure.

“No one understands mining issues better than Parrikar. But even if he has agreed to move to the Centre, his replacement could still work closely with him to resolve these matter,” said Arlekar.