Ajit Pawar's NCP hellbent on 80 seats, discord with allies on the rise

Amid hard seat-sharing negotiations, speculation that the Ajit Pawar-led NCP could contest the assembly elections independently is on the rise

MUMBAI: Amid hard seat-sharing negotiations and speculation that the Ajit Pawar-led NCP could contest the assembly elections independently, the friction between the party and its two allies, the BJP and the Shiv Sena, is on the rise.

Maharashtra Deputy CM and NCP leader Ajit Pawar. (PTI)

On Wednesday, NCP MLA Manikrao Kokate came down heavily on BJP and Shiv Sena ministers for “deliberately” not doing the work of NCP MLAs and asked them to stop the infighting. A day earlier, NCP leader Amol Mitkari had slammed four BJP ministers for their unavailability and even called them “useless”. The same day, Ajit Pawar had a heated argument with the BJP’s rural development minister Girish Mahajan over the latter’s demand for more funds.

Mahajan, who is considered a close confidante of Fadnavis, had raised the issue of inadequate provision of funds for roads in rural areas. “MLAs are under pressure, as people are demanding roads in their constituencies but there is not enough provision for this. Funds need to be increased considering the elections in the next few months,” Mahajan pointed out. Ajit, who also holds the finance portfolio, explained the financial burden on the state exchequer, given the several new schemes announced in the state budget. As Mahajan continued to argue, Pawar lost his cool and said, “The new schemes have created a burden of ₹90,000 crore. From where will money come for extra provisions? Should we sell the land to arrange it?”

The discord has come to the fore a week after the RSS-linked Marathi weekly ‘Vivek’ blamed the NCP as one of the reasons behind the BJP’s poor performance in the recently held Lok Sabha elections in Maharashtra. Before this, another RSS-linked English magazine ‘Organiser’ had also blamed the party for this.

This has led to speculation that the NCP could contest the upcoming state assembly elections on its own. The conjecture intensified when Ajit, in an informal media interaction, revealed that his party would conduct a survey of all 288 assembly seats. Two days ago, he also announced that the NCP would contest the upcoming local and civic body elections independently.

Ajit is hell bent on contesting nothing less than 80 seats and discussed this in a meeting with union home minister Amit Shah in New Delhi on Tuesday night. NCP insiders said that the demand for 80 seats was logical considering the current equations. “The NCP had won 54 seats in the last assembly polls,” explained an NCP insider. “This time it has the support of three Congress MLAs, who are likely to join the party, one PWP MLA and two independent MLAs, which takes the figure to 60 MLAs. Plus, it is in a better position to contest on around 20 of the 41 seats won by the Congress in the last polls. It is the NCP that can breach the Congress’ secular voter base and win the polls on those seats.”

Amid this tug-of-war, deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, who controls the BJP in the state, met Ajit at his official bungalow ‘Devgiri’ on Wednesday evening. The one-on-one meeting lasted for over an hour.

Kokate, in a media interaction in Nashik, said that the BJP and Shiv Sena ministers were not fulfilling their responsibility as ministers and were more interested in internal politics. “I have already spoken to Ajit Dada and informed him of the ministers’ apathy in clearing our MLAs’ proposals. They did not try to understand the issues and requested a meeting of the CM and both DCMs to ensure a decision on their pending works, be it yes or no,” the four-term MLA from Sinnar constituency remarked. He warned them of difficult times if they continued their tantrums and attempts to create hurdles over fund distribution.

Before that, Amol Mitkari, who is also a spokesperson of the party, said that four BJP ministers were not responding to MLAs. Naming revenue minister Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil, rural development minister Girish Mahajan, labour minister Suresh Khade and PWD minister Ravindra Chavan, he dubbed them “useless”. Following his remarks, state BJP president Chandrashekhar Bawankule expressed unhappiness, saying that Mitkari should have spoken to Fadnavis or him before making such a statement publicly. However, no attempts were made by the NCP to rein him in.