Shinde seizes the day, projects himself as Maharashtra govt's ‘Maratha face’

In recent weeks, as Maharashtra’s game of political snakes and ladders continues apace, CM Eknath Shinde has emerged as an authoritative Maratha leader.

Mumbai: Amid the turmoil in his state over reservation for Marathas, chief minister Eknath Shinde landed at Kupwara in Jammu and Kashmir on Tuesday to unveil a statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj erected by the Maratha battalion of the Indian army. As the cry of ‘Jai Bhavani, Jai Shivaji’ rent the air, Eknath Shinde, who has been struggling to create a political constituency outside of Thane, was at pains to underscore his Maratha identity.

Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde regularly spoke to activist Manoj Jarange-Patil during the latter's hunger strike seeking reservation for the Maratha community (ANI FILE PHOTO)

In recent weeks, as Maharashtra’s game of political snakes and ladders continues apace, CM Shinde has emerged as an authoritative Maratha leader, at once a counter-balance to the populist appeal of Manoj Jarange-Patil, and also within his own cabinet and by virtue of his position, trumping Ajit Pawar’s claims as the Maratha face of the government.

He has been sympathetic to the cause of Maratha reservation, paving the way to include them within the fold of reservation granted to Kunbis. While Devendra Fadnavis has largely stayed away from dealing with Jarange Patil because he wants to shore up the OBC vote for his party, Ajit Pawar has been indisposed and out of sight throughout this crisis, leaving Shinde to call the shots.

When Jarange-Patil asked the Shinde to meet him along with his two deputy CMs before he called off his hunger strike, both Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar refused to join the CM. Ajit Pawar announced he was not in favour of giving “undue importance” to an activist creating a window for the politician in Shinde to show his persuasive skills. One of the leaders of the Shinde faction of the Shiv Sena says, “He handled everything single-handedly. No doubt, Fadnavis was with him when it came to handling the violent protests, and chalking out the strategy for resolving the reservation stalemate, but he chose to remain in the background. Shinde would speak to Jarange-Patil nearly every day, telling him that he too hails from the same community, that he too is farmer’s son and like him comes from the Maratha underclass. This helped in breaking the ice with Jarange-Patil. You may notice that while the Maratha leader has been critical of Fadnavis and not-so-cordial about Ajit Pawar, he did not say anything adverse about the CM.”

Those close to the CM admit in private that from the day Ajit Pawar joined the ruling alliance, Shinde has been unhappy as he saw the move as undercutting his importance and creating a powerful Martha rival within the government. Persistent speculation that Pawar would take over as CM any day has not helped either, leading to several instances of brinkmanship between the two men.

In the Maratha agitation and the subsequent timidity shown by Ajit Pawar, Shinde found his moment. Despite advice from bureaucrats and political associates to not engage directly with Jarange-Patil as the issue of Maratha reservation remains contentious, he went ahead and met him. “It was a calculated risk but there is an element of the street-fighter in him and it has paid off,” says a senior bureaucrat in the CMO unwilling to go on the record. His visit to Kupwara to unveil the Shivaji Maharaj statue, said the officer, was in part about the same image building exercise. “It is about showing how he, and no one else, is the Maratha face of the government.”

This effort, says Mumbai-based political analyst Hemant Desai, also allows Shinde to project himself as much more than a local Shiv Sena leader. This crisis, says Desai, has allowed Shinde for the first time to emerge from the shadow of his two heavyweight deputies.

“The CM is confident that the severity of the Maratha agitation has gone down,” says the bureaucrat in the CMO. “By the end of the next two months a few hundred thousand Kunbi caste certificates would have been issued which will, no doubt, pacify the community. The curative petition in the Supreme Court will also help the government buy more time,” he added.

On the other hand is the mobilisation of the Other Backward Castes in the state. With Fadnavis, Ajit Pawar himself and most recently his fellow NCP leader Chhagan Bhujbal coming out strongly against reservation for Marathas, Eknath Shinde will have to do a balancing act to keep both the politically influential communities happy. OBC leaders who called on Bhujbal on Tuesday to thank him for his support, also met Devendra Fadnavis later. Shinde’s projection of himself as the Maratha face of the government comes with its own pitfalls.