Newsmaker: Meet CM Manohar Parrikar, BJP's lynchpin of power in Goa

Is Goa headed for an extended period of political instability? Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar is seriously ill and evidence suggests that without him, the state has been only borderline stable.

Parrikar became chief minister of Goa for the first time in October 2000 (raising the strength of the BJP from four MLAs in 1994 to 17 in 2002). But he served for just two years. He lost power because of his own mistakes, he cheerily admitted, but was back in office four months later to rule till 2005, when he lost the election largely on account of his belief that only