Cabinet reshuffle likely in Goa after 8 Congress MLAs join ruling BJP

Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant met Governor P S Sreedharan Pillai on Thursday morning amid talk of a cabinet reshuffle in the wake of eight Congress MLAs joining the ruling BJP.

The chief minister, however, told reporters here that the meeting, which followed Wednesday's dramatic developments, had nothing to do with politics. He met the governor at Raj Bhavan to discuss programs for the celebration of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's birthday (September 17), Sawant said. But a senior BJP leader said a reshuffle was likely in the next few days as the party would need to accommodate at least a couple of Congress MLAs who have crossed over, including former chief minister Digambar Kamat. The BJP now has 28 MLAs in the 40-member Assembly after eight Congress MLAs switched sides on Wednesday. In 2019, when 10 out of 15 Congress MLAs had defected to the BJP en-masse, the ruling party had dropped three ministers to accommodate three new entrants, and the same pattern may be followed now, the leader said.

The current cabinet has eleven ministers from the BJP besides Sudin Dhavalikar of the ally MGP. The state can have maximum of 12 ministers.