Panaji: Independent Goa MLA and Minister
Vishwajit Rane today resigned from the cabinet and the state
Assembly to join the Congress party hours before being
re-inducted into the government.
Rane, a first-term MLA and health minister in the
Digamber Kamat government, quit both from the House and the
cabinet before being sworn in again as a minister by Governor
S S Sidhu at a ceremony at Raj Bhavan.
Rane, son of veteran Congress leader and state
Assembly Speaker Pratapsinh Rane, can continue as minister for
six months without getting elected to the state legislature.
He represented Valpoi in the 40-member House.
He had contested and won the 2007 Assembly elections
as an independent after being denied Congress nomination.
Earlier, he joined the Congress in the presence of
state party President Subhash Shirodkar and Kamat.
Describing his joining the Congress party as
"homecoming", Rane said he was always a Congressman at heart.
"I was always a Congressman. I contested the last
polls as an independent as I was denied party ticket. Now I
have returned to the Congress to give stability to the present
government," he told reporters after taking oath as Minister.
Earlier this week, UGDP legislator Atanasio Babush Monserratte had joined the Congress.
PTI
