Summary:
PANAJI: Multilingual writer, poet, dramatist, journalist and politician, 53-year-old Vishnu Surya Wagh breathed his last in South Africa on February 8, his wife Aruna announced on Wednesday. As the vice-chairperson ESG, Wagh oversaw one edition of the International Film Festival of India. After suffering a stroke on May 15, 2016, the former St Andre MLA was bedridden and, as a result, out of active public life.As per the statement released by his wife, Wagh “passed on peacefully in South Africa while he was on a tour to Cape Town and Johannesburg as per his wish and desire”. She later said that they would return with his body in a day or two.Recently, a video of his sons participating in a healing session in South Africa had gone viral.Wagh was the St Andre MLA for the term 2012-2017 during which he had a stint as deputy speaker of Goa assembly.Born on July 24, 1965, the multi-hyphenated personality entered politics in the 1990s. He first joined Shiv Sena and then moved to MGP, Congress, and most recently BJP, of which he was an MLA when he took ill.Having penned almost 20 plays each in Konkani and Marathi, besides scripts for a Marathi film, Wagh was awarded the Goa Ratna among other honours.He was one of the most vocal advocates for the rights of the Bhandari Samaj community in Goa to which he belonged, and was most recently embroiled in a controversy for the explosive content of his book ‘Sudir Sukt’..