Dayanand Bandodkar


Dayanand Balkrishna "Bhausaheb" Bandodkar was an Indian politician who served as the first Chief Minister of [Goa, Daman and Diu], holding the office from 1963 to 1973, with a gap of President's rule in late 1966. Born in Pernem to a Marathi family who had immigrated from Tuljapur in British India, he became a wealthy mine owner following the annexation of Goa. He unsuccessfully sought to merge the union territory of Goa with the state of Maharashtra. Bandodkar swept the polls in 1963, 1967 and in 1972 while representing the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party and remained in power until his death in 1973.

Attempt to merge Goa

Bandodkar was a member of the Gomantak Maratha Samaj in Portuguese Goa. His proposal to merge Goa with Maharashtra was met with stiff opposition from the native Goans, led by his political rival Jack de Sequeira and the United Goans Party. Indira Gandhi, the then Prime Minister of India then offered him two options:
  1. To retain Goa's current status as a union territory.
  2. To merge Goa into the neighboring state of Maharashtra and the other erstwhile Portuguese enclaves of Daman and Diu into the neighbouring state of Gujarat.
A law to conduct a referendum to decide the issue of merger or otherwise of Goa, Daman and Diu with Maharashtra/Gujarat was passed by both the houses of the Indian Parliament, the Lok Sabha, and the Rajya Sabha and the same received the assent of the President of India, Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan on 16 December 1966. An opinion poll was subsequently held on 16 January 1967 to decide the fate of the union territory which voted to retain its separate status by 34,021 votes.

Death

Bandodkar died from a heart attack at Goa Medical College in Bambolim, Goa, while in office on 12 August 1973 at age 62 and was succeeded by his eldest daughter Shashikala Kakodkar. His only son Siddharth married the actress Leena Chandavarkar on 8 December 1975, but died at the age of 25, on 7 November 1976 due to a gunshot wound he had received on 18 December 1975.