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Miffed allies Shiv Sena and SAD call BJP ‘bossy’
Shiv Sena and SAD claim BJP is arrogant with power, saffron party dismisses allegations
The BJP’s partners have accused it of being “bossy” and throwing a “big brother attitude”, openly ventilating dissent within the ruling NDA which completes a year in office this month.
The Shiv Sena and Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) are miffed with the BJP’s “arrogance of power” but leaders of the saffron party dismissed the accusations as muscle-flexing to secure more representation at the Centre.
The council of ministers accommodates just one member each from the BJP’s partners and some of the parties are looking to get a couple of more berths.
Food processing minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal represents the SAD in the Union ministry and this “lightweight portfolio” has made the party angry. It is also anxious about the BJP’s plan to tweak the seat-sharing arrangement for the 2017 Punjab polls.
“We are not going to concede a single extra seat to the BJP,” a SAD leader said.
The BJP contests 23 of the 117 seats in the state, leaving the rest for the SAD.
“There is no mechanism for coordination amongst allies. Concerns of the allies have to be addressed,” SAD leader Naresh Gujral said.
Both SAD in Punjab and Sena in Maharashtra are unhappy with the government’s push to pass a land bill that will make it easier for industry to buy farmland. The two parties can’t afford to be seen as anti-farmer, a label the Opposition has successfully managed to weave around the proposed law.
Sena mouthpiece Saamna taunted the BJP in an editorial on Thursday, saying the party can take away land from farmers anywhere in the country, but cannot show the “same courage” in Jammu and Kashmir because of Article 370.
The Sena’s equation with its ally has tottered after the BJP won more seats in the Maharashtra assembly polls and started laying claim to Maratha politics.
The PDP, the BJP’s partner in Jammu and Kashmir, doesn’t settle for taunts but openly expresses its differences on issues such as resettlement of Kashmiri Pandits.
TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu was not pleased with the BJP for flirting with the Telangana Rashtra Samithi and the YSR Congress, sources said.
