Advocate Yatish Naik, who is the General Secretary of the Goa Trinamool Congress (TMC) and the party's star campaigner, resigned from the party a few days before the elections this month. As he stated in the letter, Advocate Naik resigned because of the way that the party is operating. The development came four days after Mamata Banerjee's party released the names of candidates for the upcoming elections.

Yatish Naik wrote in a letter that he does not wish to be part of a party that is "devoid of all principles".

"Seeing the manner in which the party is functioning, I find no good reason to continue being a member of the party. I feel humiliated, tired and dejected for having been made to go through all this," his letter reads.

It was announced on January 22 that TMC had released its list of star campaigners for the upcoming elections in 2022. Mamata Banerjee, chief of the TMC and former West Bengal Chief Minister, will lead the campaign, as per the newly released list. Among the star campaigners on the list are TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee, Derek O'Brien, Bengal Sports Minister Manoj Tiwary, MP Sushmita Dev, and Babul Supriyo.

The TMC has further given the opportunity to former Congressman Saifulla Khan to contest from the Vasco Assembly seat, whereas Tarak Arolkar, who recently quit the Congress to join the TMC, has been given a ticket from Mapusa Assembly constituency.

The TMC welcomed Naik as one of the first nine members in the presence of Mamata Banerjee at its Kolkata headquarters. A single phase of elections is scheduled to take place in Goa on February 14 for election of 40 members of the Legislative Assembly. The Election Commission of India announced that the results of the Goa Election 2022 would be announced on March 10.

BJP may come out on top by a very narrow margin in Goa according to the Republic-P Marq Opinion Poll, while the Congress may end up being the main opposition party. Based on the latest pre-election survey conducted by P-Marq, the BJP is expected to win 16-20 seats, while the Congress is likely to win 9-13 seats. P-Marq predicts the AAP will win 4-8 seats while the Trinamool Congress (TMC) will gain 1-5 seats. 

Image source: opindia