Jack de Sequeira

On 16 January 2007 a life sized statue of Dr. Jack was inaugurated at Calangute. Another statue was inaugurated on 20 April 2007 at Dona Paula. The cost of the statue was borne by his family and not by the government. A third statue will be installed in Salcette.

He represented Santa Cruz assembly constituency three times. He lost in the fourth attempt in 1979 and did not contest elections again.

In 1977, Sequeira retained Santa Cruz with 4462 votes (46.11%), beating the MGP which scored 2656 (27.45%) votes.

In the 1972 elections, he retained the seat with 6586 votes (57.51%), with his closest Independent rival gaining 4483 (39.15%) votes.

The opinion poll was held on 16 January 1967. A total of 3,17,633 votes were polled. The merger was defeated by 34,021 votes.

In 1967, 1972 and 1977, Sequeira contested the Santa Cruz constituency, for the first two times on a UGP ticket, and on a Janata Party ticket on the last occasion, after the merger of the UGP into the Janata Party.

In 1967, he got 7087 (59.94%) votes, as against 121 (1.02%) by the MGP, and 570 (4.82%) by Independents. His main rival was a UG (Furtado) candidate, contesting on behalf of a party that had broken away from his. The UG (Furtado) party won 4045 votes (34.21%).

However Shastri died in 1966 in Tashkent and this decision was now left to the new Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Again Dr. Jack and his legislators met the new Prime Minister and submitted a memorandum that such a monumental decision affecting the future of the State could not be left to legislators alone, but should be put before the people to decide. The referendum could be conducted via a signature campaign or by secret ballot. Since a large number of Goans worked outside Goa, and indeed, outside India itself as expats, UGP demanded that these expats should be allowed to vote by postal ballot. Parliament finally agreed to conduct a referendum by means of secret ballot but ruled out postal ballots.

Now that the referendum would be conducted, Dr. Sequeira feared that Bandodkar may use the state’s administrative and law-enforcement machinery to browbeat the anti-mergerists into submission. The UGP demanded that the MGP government resign so that the referendum could be conducted in a free-and-fair atmosphere. On 3 December 1966, the MGP government resigned.

Of the 30 seats in the assembly 28 belonged to Goa, and one each to Daman and Diu. MGP formed the government, having secured 16 seats while UGP secured 12. The assembly of Goa, Daman and Diu convened on 9 January 1964. Dayanand Bandodkar of MGP became the first Chief Minister.

He was Goa's first Leader of the Opposition when the Legislative Assembly was launched in 1963. He was born to Goan parents in British Burma, and shaped politics in Goa during the 1960s and 1970s in particular.

In 1963, Sequeira won Panjim with 2761 votes (42.02%) as against 2347 for the MGP (35.72%), 1371 for the Congress (20.87%) and 91 votes (1.39%) for Independents.

In his analysis of the 1963 Goa elections, Ram Joshi argues that the

The United Goans Party (UGP) was formed in 1962-63 following the merger of three local parties. Dr Sequeira was its founding president.

Goa was annexed into India by an Indian Army operation on 19 December 1961. It was integrated into the Indian Union in 1962.

Jack de Sequeira (Born João Hugo Eduardo de Sequeira; 20 April 1915 – 17 October 1989), popularly known as Dr Jack de Sequeira; also known as Jak Siker according to local naming conventions, was an Indian politician and is widely considered in Goa to be the "Father of the Opinion Poll", which led to the former territory attaining statehood in 1987.

Dr. Sequeira was born in British Burma (now Myanmar) on 20 April 1915, to Mr. Erasmo de Sequeira and Mrs. Ana Julia de Sa e Sequeira.