Goa Assembly Election 2022: Can AAP’s Alina Saldanha Register a Hat-trick From Cortalim?

In 2017, Alina Saldanha of Bharatiya Janata Party won the seat by defeating Antonio Vas from Independent with a margin of 518 votes.

Goa Assembly Election 2022: Cortalim is a village situated in south Goa and one of the 40 Goa Legislative Assembly constituencies. The village is mainly a Christian village and the main occupation of the people here is fishing and agriculture. Cortalim is also well known as the site of the ancient temple of Lord Shiva. In 2017, Alina Saldanha of Bharatiya Janata Party won the seat by defeating Antonio Vas from Independent with a margin of 518 votes. However, in December 2021, Alina Saldanha resigned from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and joined the Aam Aadmi Party. Saldanha had contested and won the by-election to the Cortalim assembly segment in Goa in 2012 after the incumbent MLA, her husband, died. She contested on a BJP ticket and retained the seat in the 2017 polls.

This time, the Goa assembly election is all set to be a multi-cornered contest with the entry of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Trinamool Congress (TMC), set to give BJP a tough fight. While AAP has announced that it will contest all the 40 seats, the TMC has allied with the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP). The Congress has joined hands with Vijay Sardesai’s Goa Forward Party (GFP).

KEY CANDIDATES 

1. Narayan G Naik: BJP
2. Olencio Simoes: Congress
3. Alina Saldanha: AAP
4. Gilbert Rodrigues: TMC-MGP

What does opinion poll suggest?

According to a poll conducted by Zee News, termed – ‘Janata Ka Mood’, Congress is gaining big in South Goa, the Congress-GFP alliance may get 41% vote share here, while BJP may bag 32%, TMC-MGP is likely to get 12%, Aam Aadmi Party 7%, and others may get 8% vote share. For North Goa, the Chief Minister Pramod Sawant-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is likely to gain 38 per cent of the vote share in the region as compared to 36 per cent in 2017. The vote of the Aam Aadmi Party is also likely to increase its vote per cent from 6 per cent in 2017 to 10 per cent in 2022.

FULL SCHEDULE: GOA ASSEMBLY ELECTION 2022

The term of the current Goa assembly will expire on March 15, 2022. The elections for the 40-member Goa Assembly will be held in single-phase on February 14. The votes will be counted and the results will be declared on 10 March 2022. The EC is expected to implement a strict Covid-19 protocol as it announces poll dates amid a surge in coronavirus cases in India. Chief minister Pramod Sawant will be contesting from Sanquelim while deputy chief minister Manohar Ajgaonkar will contest from Margaon.

• Date of Polling: February 14, 2022
• Date of Counting: March 10, 2022