MUMBAI: Thrown out of power in Maharashtra by the unprecedented alliance of traditional rivals Shiv Sena and the Congress-NCP combine, the BJP has been facing an uphill task of keeping its flock together in the state. For the saffron party’s state leadership, every alternate day has been dawning with some or the other leader joining either the NCP or the Sena.
The party is also feeling the vacuum left behind by mass leaders like Gopinath Munde and Pramod Mahajan. Veteran politician Eknath Khadse, who recently crossed over to the NCP, said the BJP was no more a party of honest workers. “I spent almost 40 years in the BJP and helped it expand in every nook and corner of the state. There were days when no one wanted to join the BJP and people used to criticise us as a ‘Brahmin-Baniya party’. I worked hard along with my leaders Munde and Mahajan to change the party’s image. But, I was humiliated and saw no future in the party,” Khadse said.
“The present leadership cannot keep the flock together for a long time. Sooner or later, people will leave the party.” State minister and NCP leader Nawab Malik said, “Every day we get calls from BJP leaders and workers showing their willingness to join the NCP. Our Maha Vikas Aghadi is more stable and secured now.” A senior BJP leader admitted that the MVA government is unlikely to fall anytime soon. “Our leadership tried but could not succeed.
Now, the NCP and the Sena will fight the next assembly elections together. Therefore, everyone who had joined the BJP for power is suddenly seeing a dim future,” said the leader. Many BJP leaders have become restless after they started receiving notices for old cases, he added. The state police had filed an FIR against BJP MLA and former minister Girish Mahajan in connection with an extortion case. He is known to be close to former chief minister Devendra Fadnavis.
MLC Prasad Lad received a notice from state’s Economic Offense Wing for alleged fraud in BMC in 2014. The Opposition leader in the legislative council Pravin Darekar is facing inquiry in a bank fraud case. Another BJP leader said the party’s future in the state is now dependent on PM Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.
Cong, Sena rift over Aurangabad widens
Mumbai: The rift in the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) in Maharashtra over renaming Aurangabad city has widened after the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) mentioned the city as Sambhaji Nagar in a tweet even as the Congress strongly opposed the move. Shiv Sena, which heads the three-party alliance in the state, has been at loggerheads with Congress, which says that renaming does not figure in the common minimum programme of the alliance. Replying to the tweet, State Congress chief Balasaheb Thorat reiterated his party’s opposition.