Not 50:50, but Manohar Joshi formula
BJP and Shiv Sena appear like a middle-aged couple, who can’t stop quarrelling but are too old to get new partners. So, can’t do without each other. Right now, Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray is ‘hurt’ with his other half, and not quite ready to patch up unless 50 per cent of power-pie is shared. Sena insiders claim Udhav Thackeray is ‘really upset’ that ‘commitment’ is not kept by the partner. That Sena has been made to do all the adjustments over the decades, whether in seat sharing or power sharing or even portfolio sharing in the Centre and the State. In 1995, when the Sena was still the pivot of the alliance, it had kept the CM seat but parted with the most coveted ministries Finance and Home to make BJP happy.
Well, that’s called Manohar Joshi formula in Maharashtra politics, evolved by the first coalition government in the state. Sena’s Joshi was the CM. Thereafter, others too followed the MJ formula. The local BJP, particularly Devendra Fadnavis, Sena alleges, is ‘so full of arrogance’ that even the Manohar Joshi formula is not acceptable to him. Though with 105 seats, BJP’s dependence on Shiv Sena has increased. All eyes are now on the Thackerays...if and when they blink.
Sonia Gandhi ‘adamant’
The Congress MLAs of Maharashtra are no less upset than the Shiv Sena. The reasons are linked, yet quite different. The MPCC entourage which went to 10 Janpath to impress upon Sonia Gandhi, the ‘need of the hour’, in other words to allow them the flexibility to explore options, came back disheartened. The interim party chief refused to give them a go-ahead to back a Shiv Sena-NCP alliance from ‘outside’. ‘’She was quite adamant”, a former Congress CM of Maharashtra grimaced.
Not before adding that ‘she’ was driven by north Indian politics, and her interest in safeguarding her own seat in UP! Also, they (the Gandhi family members) are ready to sacrifice the fate and future of the party in the west and the south, to please the ‘Khan Market gang’. Sonia, it seems, told the Maharashtra delegation that the Congress and the Shiv Sena are ideologically incompatible. Plus the Stodgy verdict is awaited. A Muslim leader from the state was sent in, to persuade her yet again. To little avail though.
In search of a scapegoat
BJP may have formed a government in Haryana with a deputy — Dushyant Chautala of JJP — in toe, and in likelihood will be sworn back to office in Maharashtra by end of next week, but a quiet blame is on. How did the party come to this pass that it was saddled by a deputy in Haryana and may have to concede more in Maharashtra? From the new central team’s cluelessness to infighting among the local leaders, blame is being apportioned depending on who’s putting it. The party is particularly sore over the losses it incurred in certain constituencies because of ticket distribution faux pas. (Sounds so much like the old Congress!)
BCCI land
The land on which the BCCI headquarters in Mumbai stands in Wankhede Stadium, Vinod Mankad Road, belongs to Mumbai Cricket Association. The richie rich sports body has no land of its own in Mumbai, but does have a sprawling 15 acres of land near Kempegowda Airport, Bengaluru. So the moment Sourav Ganguly went for a recce of the site, the local news channels went on an overdrive. Convinced as they were that the new BCCI chief was all set to shift the headquarters to Bengaluru; only to be disillusioned. Not the BCCI, the NCA will be shifting out of Chinnaswamy Stadium to a state-of-the-art facility to come up on the empty acres. Ganguly and Rahul Dravid, meanwhile, met amidst bonhomie, and backslapping.