Goa: TMC in touch with netas across parties for 2022 polls

PANAJI: Riding high on its Bengal victory, Trinamool Congress has decided to enter Goa with all “seriousness” and will contest the assembly elections scheduled for early next year.
“We are not here to (just) participate in the 2022 election but to win the elections. That’s the seriousness we are going ahead with,” Derek O’Brien, its parliamentary party leader in Rajya Sabha, who has been camping in Goa for the past few days, told TOI.
Indicating that TMC is in touch with several politicians cutting across party lines, he claimed they have been attracting “good people”.
O’Brien: TMC will even get BJP votes, like it happened in WB
He also said the party would field formidable candidates in the elections.
“TMC in Goa will be a party of the people of Goa, by the Goans and for the Goans. We are a federal party and there is no high command culture here,” Derek O’Brien said.
Making it clear that they are ready to take on BJP, he dismissed the argument that entry of TMC would further divide non-BJP votes. “The question doesn’t arise, as we’ll get even BJP votes, the way it happened in West Bengal,” he said during an informal interaction.
O’Brien, who has been having meetings with politicians, professionals, civil society members and others since his arrival in Goa on Friday, declined to reveal the party’s plans but said Goa will know once things begin to unfold next month. He also refused to name any politician that the party is in touch with.
Sources in TMC told TOI that the party will open its office next month after which West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee will visit Goa. “They are already scouting for office space and by October, the party organisation will start operating fullfledged here,” sources said.
They also said the party has been in touch with some senior politicians for some time now and their joining will take place next month. As reported earlier by TOI, one is being offered a Rajya Sabha seat.
A party official said TMC has done a lot of groundwork before deciding to contest the Goa polls. “The decision was taken by Didi and her team after the political strategy agency engaged by the party submitted its report,” O’Brien said.
A team of 180 persons of political strategist Prashant Kishor’s agency was in Goa for over two months before preparing a report on the political situation in the state. They found that there was strong resentment in the state against BJP and that there was space for a formidable opposition to fight the saffron party, TMC sources said.
Analysing the reports, TMC’s core committee decided to expand its base in Goa, besides Tripura.