Margao: Tribal welfare minister Ramesh Tawadkar on Wednesday said reservation of assembly seats for Scheduled Tribes (STs) would be in place before the 2027 polls, adding that govt was in touch with Centre and tracking the progress every two days.“Reservation of seats for STs will happen, 100%. I am monitoring the progress on a regular basis,” Tawadkar said.He said govt, particularly the officer on special duty (OSD) to the chief minister, was in touch with the authorities concerned at the Centre. “I am confident it will happen before the 2027 polls,” the minister said.The assurance comes as the likely reservation of four assembly constituencies — Quepem, Sanguem, Nuvem and Priol — for ST candidates has triggered a scramble among sitting MLAs and aspiring candidates to identify “safer” constituencies. Though Election Commission is yet to notify the reserved constituencies, at least two prominent legislators have already spoken publicly about their fallback plans.The Readjustment of Representation of Scheduled Tribes in Assembly Constituencies of the State of Goa Act, 2025, was brought into force by Centre on Aug 6, setting in motion the legal process to reserve four assembly seats for ST candidates. The process requires the registrar general and census commissioner to ascertain Goa’s ST population, followed by a delimitation exercise.Quepem, Sanguem, Priol and Nuvem have consistently figured among the likely constituencies for reservation.
