PANAJI: The warring factions in the central committee of the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party, one of the oldest political outfits in the state, on Thursday decided to bury their differences and work for its betterment so as to live up to the aspirations of the party workers and people of the state in general.

Addressing a press conference after a meeting of the central committee, where the MGP leaders decided to sink their difference, its president, Mr Pandurang Raut told reporters that the party leaders decided to not only work together but also withdraw all the court cases filed against one another.
Mr Raut further said that the party workers and the supporters were disturbed by the differences that had cropped up among the leaders of MGP and wanted the leaders to work together to rebuild the party to reclaim its position in the Goan polity.
“Respecting the wishes of the party workers and the general public we decided to forget the past and work together,” he said.
Ms Shashikala Kakodkar, a former chief minister of the state and past president of the MGP, said that ever since the differences cropped up in the central committee of the party the party workers felt disenchanted and some of them approached her to intervene and break the deadlock among the MGP leaders.
She said that though she had kept away from the politics she decided to work for forging the unity among the warring factions following the appeal of the party workers.
She said that over the past two months she tried hard to bring consensus among the warring factions and the issues among them were resolved on Thursday.
Accordingly, both the factions would withdraw the cases from the courts and work together for the betterment of the party by forgetting the past and looking ahead for a better future, she said.
Ms Kakodkar announced that the present central committee would continue to hold office till May 2010 or till it was replaced by a newly elected body.
She said that an advisory committee has been formed under her chairmanship to guide the party leaders. The other members of the committee are Mr Ramkrishna Dhavalikar (Transport Minister and party MLA from Madkai) and Mr Mahendra Raikar.
Mr Pandurang Dhavalikar, the MGP MLA from Priol and its working president, said that a meeting of the party has been called next month to discuss future programmes.