Allocation of additional portfolios: Cong hails Goa CM

Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant's recent move to allocate specific portfolios to his ministerial colleagues seems to have found support from the most unlikely quarter--the Congress.

The allocation was done last week amid rumours that many ministers are not happy with the additional portfolios.

"It is appreciated that the chief minister has shown that no blackmail would be tolerated by being firm on distribution of portfolios," Congress' Goa Spokesman Trajano D'Mello said in a tweet.

"These were the same blackmailers who opposed him (CM) to be the CM allowing the state administration to be run from the ICU (Intensive Care Unit)," he said in an apparent reference to initial opposition to Sawant's name as predecessor to late Manohar Parrikar.

"It is time for the CM to deliver," he added.

All the ministers in the BJP-led dispensation, except Vinod Palyekar of the Goa Forward Party (GFP) were given additional portfolios which were till now handled by Sawant, who as CM, was holding charge of over two dozen departments since he sworn in after Parrikar's demise on March 17.