Panaji: Newly appointed Goa Congress chief Shantaram Naik on Saturday said his priority would be to strengthen the party in the coastal state and "not to topple" the Manohar Parrikar-led government, which he claimed would "collapse on its own".
Naik was appointed the Goa Pradesh Congress Committee president yesterday.
"Our top priority is building the Congress party. As far as the government is concerned, we will not pull it down. It will collapse on its own. But, we will also not shirk our responsibility of forming an alternative government," he told reporters after taking charge as Goa Congress chief.
Naik expressed confidence that the BJP-led government in the state would "fall under its own weight" and the Congress would not be required to do anything in that regard.
He said he would be assessing the party base in the constituencies where Congress candidates had lost in February's state Assembly election.
"We will hold booth-level meetings in all the constituencies," he added.
Naik said he would be updating the database of party workers on his ipad, so that it would be at his fingertips. Naik succeeded former Goa chief minister Luizinho Faleiro, under whom the party had done well in the February election, bagging 17 of the 40 seats, but failed to form the government.
Earlier, Congress secretary Girish Chodankar said the appointment of Naik as the party chief in Goa would lift the morale of the cadre after the BJP stitched a last-minute coalition with smaller regional parties and independents and formed the government in the coastal state.
"The party cadre were demoralised as despite the numbers, the Congress could not form the government after the 2017 Goa Assembly polls. Naik's appointment will boost their morale," he told PTI.
The Congress in Goa is gearing up for by-election to two Assembly seats -- Panaji and Valpoi.
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