On July 16, a day before the start of the monsoon session of the Maharashtra legislature, Chief Minister Eknath Shinde made an interesting remark at the customary media briefing. Explaining how his government’s two deputy chief ministers would work together, Shinde said, “Ajit dada [Pawar] is known to start working from early morning, I work late into the night and Devendra ji [Fadnavis] is an all-rounder who can tackle any issue at any hour of the day.”While the remark caused some laughter, many observers felt it was an attempt to cover up the unease within the Shinde camp following the induction of Ajit Pawar and his group of Nationalist Congress Party legislators into the state government.
The spin doctors of the ruling alliance are hyping up the grouping of the Shinde-led Shiv Sena, the Ajit Pawar faction of the NCP and the BJP as a ‘Maha Yuti’―grand alliance―which will fight the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi, comprising Uddhav Thackeray’s Shiv Sena faction, the Sharad Pawar faction of the NCP and the Congress in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. However, not everyone is convinced about how the new alliance would work on the ground.
While the BJP’s central leadership is elated by Ajit’s rebellion and his faction’s entry into the government, the same cannot be said about Shinde and his party. A few days after Ajit and his eight colleagues took oath as ministers, Shambhuraj Desai, Shinde loyalist and senior cabinet minister, said there was no need to expand the ruling alliance as it already had a comfortable majority. “Now if the Shiv Sena (Uddhav faction) reaches out to us with sincerity, we will certainly think about responding positively,”said Desai. Shinde faction MLA Sanjay Shirsat said if everything had to be shared with the Ajit faction, there was no point in being in power.
When the MVA was in power, many Sena legislators had complained to Uddhav that Ajit, who held the finance portfolio, was not giving them funds for development works. They were even unhappy with their own leadership for being too close to the NCP. Sena legislators from Raigad district were upset that after a party meeting in the district in March 2022, Uddhav’s son, Aditya Thackeray, ignored them and went to have lunch with NCP MP Sunil Tatkare and his minister daughter, Aditi. Those legislators are now with Shinde, and they are being forced to work with the Tatkares, who have joined the Ajit faction; Aditi has been made minister once again. “We will have to share our bread now. Earlier we had a full bread, but now we have to be satisfied with a half. Those who had half a bread earlier will have to satisfy themselves with just a quarter now,”Bharat Gogawale, one of the MLAs from Raigad, reportedly said.
In fact, on the day the NCP ministers were sworn in, a senior Shinde loyalist got a message to reach the Raj Bhavan quickly. He thought he was being made a minister as he had no clue about the revolt by Ajit. He reached the Raj Bhavan wearing the special dress he had ordered for the occasion. It turned out to be a major disappointment for him as he was made to sit in the front row and watch Ajit and eight of his party colleagues being sworn in by the governor.
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Ajit, who has been given the coveted finance portfolio once again, is trying to make peace with fellow legislators of the ruling coalition by sanctioning funds worth hundreds of crores of rupees, despite the opposition crying foul. Gogawale got more than Rs100 crore for his constituency, while Prashant Bamb, a BJP legislator from Aurangabad district, was sanctioned Rs700 crore.
To accommodate Ajit and his faction, the BJP has had to part with crucial portfolios like finance, energy, cooperation and medical education. This was done after Ajit’s discussions with the BJP’s central leadership. Ajit is an excellent deal maker and got what he wanted, as the state BJP leadership did not have much of a say in the process. For the BJP’s central leadership, the focus is on finding new allies in order to secure a record third term for Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
With Ajit’s induction, local BJP leaders and Shinde loyalists are facing a major challenge. Those who lost to NCP candidates in the 2019 assembly elections―especially to Ajit loyalists―will find it nearly impossible to stake claim to those seats next time. A senior BJP leader cited the example of the tribal-dominated Akole constituency in Ahmednagar district. It is represented by Kiran Lahamate, an Ajit loyalist. Lahamate was originally with the BJP and was hoping to contest the seat in 2019. But the BJP opted for Vaibhav Pichad, son of NCP veteran Madhukar Pichad, who joined the party in 2018. Lahamate responded by joining the NCP and defeating Vaibhav in the assembly polls. Lahamate is likely to contest again as part of the new alliance, and Pichad, who has been preparing for the polls, may have to explore other options.
Friend request: Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Eknath Shinde and his family in Delhi | PTI
Another leader facing a similar predicament is the BJP’s Samarjeet Ghatge from Kagal constituency in Kolhapur. He belongs to the Kagal royal family and is a sworn opponent of the incumbent MLA, the NCP’s Hasan Mushrif. Ghatge, who is close to Fadnavis, lost narrowly to Mushrif in 2019. Since then, he has been working to unseat Mushrif in the next assembly polls. However, Mushrif, who is an Ajit loyalist, is now with the BJP front and has landed a key porfolio. It is not going to be easy for Ghatge to outmanoeuvre Mushrif and get the seat.
Pankaja Munde, daughter of former BJP stalwart Gopinath Munde, too, faces a similar challenge. In the last elections, she lost to her cousin Dhananjay Munde, who was the NCP candidate. Dhananjay, a close associate of Ajit, is now a member of the cabinet. The BJP has been grooming Pankaja to take on Dhananjay and reclaim the Parli seat, her home turf. In the process, she was twice denied a seat in the legislative council as the party wanted her to focus on the assembly seat. But with Dhananjay turning a BJP ally, the party has named her national secretary, indicating that she will have to shift to national politics.
For Snehalata Kolhe, the BJP MLA who represented Kopargaon from 2014 to 2019, the situation is equally difficult. In 2019, she lost narrowly to NCP’s Ashutosh Kale. As Kale is now with Ajit, Kolhe has realised that she may not get the BJP ticket in the 2024 elections. Her son, Vivek, allied with the Congress in the local sugar cooperative body election and won against the panel floated by Kale. “Snehalata will either join the Congress or contest as an independent in 2024,” said an NCP leader from Pune.
Like the local BJP leaders, the Shinde camp, too, is worried. Rajabhau Waje, Shiv Sena MLA from Sinnar constituency during the 2014-2019 term, lost the 2019 elections to Manikrao Kokate, an Ajit loyalist. Waje was all set to join the Shinde camp and the details were being worked out when the Ajit faction switched to the BJP alliance. Waje has subsequently put his plans on hold as he and Manikrao are traditional rivals in Nashik.
Sanjay Kokate, who lost to veteran NCP leader Babanrao Shinde in the Madha assembly seat in 2019, too, is worried about his political future. He is now with the Eknath Shinde faction, but with Babanrao joining the BJP-led alliance, he is worried that his claims for the seat will be overlooked. Sanjay has already warned that his Sena faction will not work for the BJP’s Lok Sabha candidate in Madha in 2024. “If you are going with those who fought us tooth and nail, we will have no option but to work against you,” said Sanjay.
Senior political analyst Ravikiran Deshmukh said Ajit’s entry had created a wave of resentment among local leaders of the BJP and the Shinde faction. He said their core voters were upset because Ajit had the image of a corrupt politician. “Ajit and his faction were brought into the alliance because the BJP realised that Shinde was not able to garner votes,” said Deshmukh. “This became clear in the Kasba Peth assembly bypoll which the Congress won, despite the chief minister campaigning hard. The Sena vote, which has always helped the BJP win the seat, did not get transferred to the BJP candidate. It remained loyal to Uddhav by and large. Similarly, the BJP has become tired of the bullying tactics of the Shinde faction’s MLAs and ministers.”
One of Shinde’s close aides said the chief minister never wanted the Ajit faction to join the coalition. “They accepted it looking at the larger national picture that Modi should get a third term. The prime minister knows that if the BJP dumps Shinde now, a very bad message will go across the country and among the NDA allies,” he said. “That is why he hosted Shinde and his family for more than an hour in Delhi. Another plus point for Shinde is his acceptability with the RSS. Whatever the BJP’s Maharashtra leaders may say, it clearly shows that Shinde is far more valued in the BJP than Ajit Pawar.”
Yet, with Lok Sabha elections coming up in just a few months, Maharashtra politics is clearly in a state of flux. No one is quite sure about what manoeuvres might come next from Ajit’s uncle, Sharad Pawar. The BJP is clearly focused on shoring up as much support as possible for Modi’s third term. The Sena factions, meanwhile, have an unsettled look. The Ajit rebellion clearly seems just the opening act of another season of political theatre.