By IANS,
Panaji : Eight of the 11 cabinet ministers who contested the assembly elections here have had to bite the dust after a massive anti-incumbency wave knocked out the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) alliance, results of the vote-count showed Tuesday.
Among the key candidates to lose the polls are home minister Ravi Naik (Ponda), public works department minister Churchill Alemao (Navelim), power minister Aleixo Sequeira (Nuvem), urban development minister Joaquim Alemao (Cuncolim), forest minister Filipe Neri (Velim) and Babu Azgaonkar (Pernem), all from the Congress.
The two nationalist Congress party (NCP) ministers, Jose Philip D’Souza (Vasco) and Nilkanth Halarnkar (Thivim) have lost the polls. The NCP, which fielded seven candidates, is yet to open its account in the elections.
The only cabinet ministers to have won the elections are chief minister Digambar Kamat, health minister Vishwajit Rane and education minister Atanasio Monserrate.
The only other minister in the Kamat-led 12-member cabinet was transport minister Sudin Dhavalikar, a member of the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party, which aligned with the BJP in a pre-poll alliance.