Revision as of 11:41, 16 December 2024

The electoral history of Maharashtra

1951- 2024 Oct

Shyamlal Yadav, Nov 13, 2024: The Indian Express

Maharashtra, India’s richest state in per capita GDP, and home to big business, Bollywood, and large sugar cooperatives, was a Congress bastion once. Today, its political landscape is a complex patchwork of parties and factions, whose shifting allegiances determine the shape and composition of its governments.

The birth of Maharashtra

The old Bombay province sprawled from Sindh (now in Pakistan) to northwestern Karnataka, and covered all of present-day Gujarat and about two-thirds of present-day Maharashtra (excluding a few princely states). Two Marathi-speaking regions — Vidarbha, a part of Central Provinces (later Madhya Pradesh), and Marathwada, a part of the princely state of Hyderabad — lay outside the province.

The demand for a united Marathi-speaking state emerged in the 1920s, and gained momentum after Independence. In 1953, Marathi leaders signed the Nagpur Pact seeking to unite Bombay State, Vidarbha, and Marathwada, even as the State’s Gujarati community led its own agitation for statehood.

The city of Bombay was caught between these two movements. Gujaratis had played the preeminent role in its rise as the country’s economic nerve centre, but it was surrounded by Marathi-speaking districts. As the linguistic division of the state became increasingly likely, many believed that Bombay would be made a Union Territory. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru even made announcements to this effect.

However, the States Reorganisation Commission recommended in 1956 that Bombay State should remain bilingual, since it was to the “mutual advantage” of the Gujarati and Marathi communities “to be partners in a great co-operative venture”. It recommended granting Vidarbha statehood, but the Centre rejected this, making it a part of Bombay State, along with Marathwada, instead.

Neither the Marathi nor the Gujarati side was happy with this outcome, and the agitation for statehood continued. The Centre finally agreed, and on May 1, 1960, Bombay State was bifurcated. The new states of Maharashtra and Gujarat got 264 and 132 of the erstwhile Bombay State’s 396 seats.

Era of Congress dominance

In the years following Independence, the Congress was the only major political force in Bombay State — and in the first Assembly election held in 1951-52, it won 269 of the 317 seats in the Assembly. There were 268 constituencies in all — some constituencies sent more than one member to the legislature at the time. Nashik-Igatpuri was the only three-member (one General category, one SC, and one ST) Assembly constituency in the country.

Morarji Desai became the first chief minister of Bombay in 1952. In 1955-56, as the Samyukta Maharashtra Movement raged, more than 100 protesters were killed in police firing in Bombay (Mumbai) city. In the face of intense criticism, Morarji, a Gujarati from Valsad, was moved to Delhi and made the Union Finance Minister in 1956. He was succeeded by Yashwantrao Chavan, an MLA from Satara. Under Chavan’s leadership, the Congress won 234 of the 396 seats (339 constituencies) in the 1957 Assembly election.

In the 1962 Assembly election, the first to be held after the creation of Maharashtra, the Congress won 215 of the 264 seats, and Marotrao Shambshio Kannamwar became Chief Minister. Following his untimely demise the following year, the chief ministership passed to Vasantrao Naik, who remained in the post for almost 12 years.

In the 1967 elections, the Congress suffered setbacks in Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Orissa, and West Bengal. But its dominance in Maharashtra continued — under Naik, the party won 203 of the 270 seats in the Assembly.

In 1969, the party split into two factions — the Congress (O) was led by the old guard of Morarji Desai and K Kamaraj, and the Congress R, where R stood for ‘Requisitionists’, by Indira Gandhi. The Congress (O), also known as the Syndicate, made inroads in many states — but failed to win even one seat in the Maharashtra Assembly in the 1972 election. Indira’s Congress swept 222 of the 270 seats.

In February 1975, weeks before the declaration of the Emergency, Chief Minister Naik was replaced by Shankarrao Chavan, a close ally of Indira and her son Sanjay Gandhi. Shankarrao remained Chief Minister through the Emergency.

Musical chairs for CM

In the 1977 Lok Sabha election, as an anti-Congress wave swept northern India, Indira’s Congress won 20 of Maharashtra’s 48 seats, one more than the Janata Party. Shankarrao took responsibility for the loss of seats and resigned. He was replaced by Vasantdada Patil, the MLA from Sangli.

The Janata Party regime at the Centre dismissed governments in nine states, but did not touch the one in Maharashtra. However, ahead of the 1978 election in the state, the Congress suffered another split, this time led by the Karnataka leader Devaraj Urs. Urs’s Congress (U) won 69 of the 288 seats, while Indira’s Congress won 62, and Janata 99. With no party close to the majority mark, Vasantdada Patil became Chief Minister again, leading a coalition of the two Congress factions.

This government, however, fell in less than four months. Sharad Pawar, only 38 at the time, left the Congress to form the Congress (Socialist) party — and joined hands with Janata to become the youngest Chief Minister of Maharashtra in July 1978.

Meanwhile, the Janata experiment collapsed at the Centre, and Indira stormed back to power in January 1980. She dismissed Pawar’s government soon afterward — and in the Assembly election that followed, the Congress won 186 seats and returned to power. In June, A R Antulay became Maharashtra’s first and only Muslim Chief Minister.

For the next decade-and-a-half, Congress leaders played a game of musical chairs for the Chief Ministership, even as the party remained in power in Maharashtra, winning 185 seats in 1985 and 141 in 1990. None of the eight CMs during this time — Antulay, Babasaheb Bhosale, Vasantdada Patil, Shiva jirao Patil Nilangekar, Shankarrao Chavan, Sharad Pawar (twice after returning to the Congress in 1986), and Sudhakarrao Naik — completed even three years in office.

This was a period dominated by corruption scandals, trade union unrest, the rise of criminal gangs in Bombay (Mumbai), and communal tensions.

The rise of Hindutva

It was in this climate that the Hindu right grew in strength in the state. Political cartoonist Bal Thackeray had formed the Marathi nationalist Shiv Sena in 1966, and the party had its first MLA in 1972. The Shiv Sena was close to the likes of Vasantdada Patil in its early years; however, after the birth of the BJP in 1980, the two parties moved closer together as natural allies.

In the 1985 Assembly election, the BJP won 16 seats, while the Sena did not open its account. By 1990, however, the two parties’ tallies had risen to 52 and 42 seats respectively. The demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992, and the communal riots and serial blasts that followed in Bombay (Mumbai) further fuelled the rise of the Hindutva right.

In 1995, the Sena-BJP alliance came to power in Maharashtra, winning 73 and 65 seats respectively. Manohar Joshi of the Sena became Chief Minister, with the BJP’s Gopinath Munde as his deputy. The victory was inspired by Sena supremo Bal Thackeray and the BJP’s rising star Pramod Mahajan. The Congress’ won 80 seats.

Joshi moved to the Centre after the 1998 Lok Sabha election, and Thackeray chose Narayan Rane to succeed him. In 1999, after four-and-a-half years of Sena-BJP rule, early elections were called in the state.

Congress returns, with NCP

Meanwhile, Pawar had once again broken away from the Congress, quitting in 1999 after Sonia Gandhi became leader of the party. Along with P A Sangma and Tariq Anwar, Pawar formed the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).

This made the 1999 Maharashtra Assembly election a three-way fight among the NCP, Congress, and the Sena-BJP combine. The NCP won 58 seats, Congress 75, Sena 69, and BJP 56. With the Sena-BJP alliance falling short of the majority mark, Congress and NCP came together to form the government. Vilasrao Deshmukh of the Congress became Chief Minister, with NCP’s Chhagan Bhujbal as his deputy.

This Congress-NCP coalition ruled the state for the next 15 years. During this time, Deshmukh became Chief Minister twice (1999-2003, 2004-08), while Sushil Kumar Shinde (2003-04), Ashok Chavan (2009-10), and Prithviraj Chavan (2010-14) enjoyed shorter stints.

Maharashtra in Modi years

When Assembly elections were held in 2014, Thackeray, Mahajan, and Munde — three key political figures in the state — were no longer there. The BJP campaign was led by Nitin Gadkari and Amit Shah, and Bal Thackeray’s son Uddhav was in charge of the Sena. The Narendra Modi wave sweeping through the country powered the Sena-BJP alliance to power in Maharashtra. The BJP alone won 122 seats, while Sena won 66. The BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis, only 44 at the time, took oath as Chief Minister.

By the end of this term, however, differences had begun to emerge between the partners. The parties shared a common Hindutva base, and the BJP’s ambition to dominate the entire country was making the Sena insecure. Still, the partners won enough seats to be able to form the government after the 2019 election — the BJP got 105, and the Sena 56.

Their differences, however, proved to be the deal-breaker. With the Sena declining to cooperate, Ajit Pawar, Sharad Pawar’s nephew, promised to support Fadnavis on the floor of the House, and the former Chief Minister was hurriedly sworn into office. However, Ajit Pawar backed out, and Fadnavis was forced to resign merely five days later.

A new formation — the Maha Vikas Aghadi — comprising the Shiv Sena, Congress, and NCP came to power. Uddhav was sworn in as Chief Minister, and Ajit became his deputy.

But this government too was toppled after Eknath Shinde, an old Sena hand, broke away from Uddhav to ally with the BJP, and become Chief Minister himself. Fadnavis became his deputy. They were supported by Ajit, who broke the NCP and became Deputy Chief Minister alongside Fadnavis. This alliance remains in power today. Earlier this year, former Congress CM Ashok Chavan, the son of Shankarrao Chavan, joined the BJP.

Belgavi/ Belgaum

2019: Liberate ‘K'taka -occupied Maha’: Uddhav to BJP

Vaibhav Ganjapure & Sujit Mahamulkar, Dec 21, 2019 Times of India

NAGPUR: After comparing the Jamia Millia Islamia police action on students protesting against the CAA to the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of 1919 earlier this week, Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray on Thursday came up with a new description for Belagavi and its surrounding Marathi speaking parts, calling the area “Karnataka occupied-Maharashtra”.

Borrowing from the term Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir, Thackeray asked the BJP to help fulfil the aspirations of the Marathi people who found themselves on the Karnataka side of the border after the reorganisation of states on the basis of language in the 1950s.

Speaking in the assembly on governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari’s speech during the winter session of the legislature in the second capital of the state,Thackeray attacked the BJP on CAA, saying that when its government at the Centre and the state had failed to give justice to Hindus in the country, how could it ensure justice for those living in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.

“Your party has now taken over the reins in Karnataka under B S Yediyurappa but still the atrocities on Marathi-speaking brethren continue in those areas,” he said. “When the case is being heard in the SC, the BJP-led government has backed Karnataka on the issue, which is very unfortunate. We should come together to liberate Karnataka occupied-Maharashtra.”

BJP- Shiv Sena alliances

Till 2018

Ambarish Mishra, Sena won’t ally with BJP in 2019 polls, January 24, 2018: The Times of India

Seats, contested and won- Lok Sabha elections (1991-2014) and Assembly elections (1990-2014)
From: Ambarish Mishra, Sena won’t ally with BJP in 2019 polls, January 24, 2018: The Times of India

See graphic:

Seats, contested and won- Lok Sabha elections (1991-2014) and Assembly elections (1990-2014)

Shiv Sena, BJP’s oldest — and for 25 years its sturdiest — ally, announced it would go solo for Lok Sabha and Maharashtra polls in 2019. While Sena’s newly constituted national executive passed a resolution to this effect, Sena president

“This regime thrives only on hollow ad campaigns. It needs to be brought down,” Uddhav said at a party conclave that saw his son, Aaditya, being elevated to the status of a ‘neta’ in Sena.

Sena to poach Hindutva radicals

Though Sena is not withdrawing from the Modi government or the BJP-led state government as of now, its stand, and especially Uddhav’s call to defeat the Modi regime, is certain to worsen Sena-BJP ties, rocky since mid-2014, and raise doubts over Sena’s role in the BJP-led NDA at the Centre.

Though the allies fought the 2014 LS polls unitedly, Matoshree snapped ties with BJP for the October 2014 state elections, only to later join the Devendra Fadnavis-led government as BJP’s junior partner. The tie-up came apart again for the 2017 Mumbai civic polls where BJP fell just 2 seats short of the Sena tally.

Uddhav also spelt out Sena’s expansion plan with militant Hindutva as its plank. Addressing party functionaries at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel stadium in Worli, he said, “We will expand across the country. Hereafter we will contest every election in every state with Hindutva as our mantra,” he said.

Uddhav’s gameplan is to poach on the radical quotient in the BJP- R-S-S ahead of the 2019 polls by flaunting aggressive Hindutva and projecting BJP as a feeble party with little or no legitimate claim to Hindutva, said Sena watchers. They pointed out that a section in the Sangh Parivar is unhappy with the Modi regime for being “soft” on issues such as Kashmir, Ram Janmabhoomi, Article 370 and even triple talaq.

The Sena also passed a resolution to win “at least 25 LS seats (out of 48 in the state) and 150 assembly seats (out of 288)” in 2019.

Raising the Kashmir issue, Uddhav said the nation needed an aggressive leader like Sardar Patel. In a dig at PM Modi who routinely heaps praise on India’s first home minister, he said, “Had the Sardar been alive today, he would have resolved the Kashmir issue and also the Pakistan issue once and for all.”

Uddhav also criticised Modi for taking Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu to Ahmedabad for a kite-flying session recently. “Why Ahmedabad? The PM should have taken his Israeli counterpart to Srinagar to hoist the national flag there,” he said.

Accusing the Modi government of issuing “hollow threats” to Pakistan, Uddhav said those in power have no empathy for Indian soldiers killed along the border and in terror attacks. “It’s high time the Pakistan problem is put to an end forever. But our leaders have become ‘mastawaal’ (power-drunk and reckless),” he said.

He also slammed Union minister Nitin Gadkari for being critical of the Navy and chided state BJP minister Chandrakant Patil for praising the Kannada language in Belgaum, an area at the centre of the Maharashtra-Karnataka border row. “Patil should have spared a thought for Marathis who have been living along the border,” said Uddhav, indicating that along with Hindutva, the Sena would also sharpen its Marathi plank.

Court judgements

Marriage cannot be ground to sack woman: SC

AmitAnand.Choudhary, February 21, 2024: The Times of India

SC: Marriage cannot be ground to sack woman

New Delhi : Observing that any law which makes marriage of woman employees and their domestic involvement a ground for disentitlement is unconstitutional, Supreme Court has directed the Centre to pay Rs 60 lakh to a permanent commissioned officer from Military Nursing Service, who was fired from her job in 1988 after she got married.


Lt Selina John’s job was terminated as per Army instruction no. 61 of 1977 titled “Terms and Conditions of Service for the Grant of Permanent Commissions in the Military Nursing Service”, but it was withdrawn in 1995 when litigation was pending. 
“Acceptance of such a patriarchal rule undermines hu man dignity and right to nondiscrimination,” the court said while hearing an appeal by the Centre challenging an Armed Forces Tribunal order for her reinstatement.

Religious nationalism

2022, early ’23

Nayonika Bose, Zeeshan Shaikh , Alok Deshpande, March 27, 2023: The Indian Express

Starting November last year, at least 50 ‘Hindu Jan Aakrosh Morcha’ rallies have been held across Maharashtra, in almost all of the state’s 36 districts. Each of these events has followed a set pattern: a brief march through the heart of the city, amid a sea of saffron flags and caps, followed by a short rally, where speakers on a makeshift dais attack minorities, invoke “love jihad”, “land jihad”, “forced conversions”, and call for the economic boycott of the Muslim community.

For the record, the BJP distances itself from these rallies, saying they are by the Sakal Hindu Samaj, an umbrella body of Hindutva and Sangh organisations, but almost all of these events have had the presence of party leaders, including the local BJP MLA and MP. The speeches, however, are largely delivered by right-wing hardliners, including suspended BJP leader and Telangana MLA T Raja Singh, Kalicharan Maharaj and Kajal Hindustani — at least two of them (Singh and Maharaj) face hate speech cases both in the state and elsewhere.

While Singh was suspended by the BJP in August last year for his remarks on Islam and Prophet Mohammed, he is a familiar face at such rallies in Maharashtra. Kalicharan Maharaj, aka Abhijit Dhananjay Sarang, is from Akola in Maharashtra. A proponent of a ‘Hindu Rashtra’, he was arrested in December 2021 for his speech at a dharam sansad in Raipur, where he allegedly hailed Nathuram Godse. Kajal Hindustani, aka Kajal Shingala, is a Gujarat-based Hindutva activist.

At one such rally, at Mumbai’s Mira Road on March 12, speeches were made against “Islamic aggression”, “love jihad” and “land jihad”, with some of the speakers calling for an economic boycott of Muslims.

“There are three major aspects of Islamic aggression. First is love jihad, second comes land jihad and finally there is the problem of conversion… For these…there is a Ram-led solution – one where you will not be stopped by political leaders, the Supreme Court or even the media. That solution is their economic boycott,” said Kajal Hindustani.

A 2-km march that preceded the speeches was flagged off by Geeta Jain, independent MLA from Mira Bhayandar who is supporting the government. The event was attended by BJP MLA Nitesh Rane along with local BJP leaders and members of outfits such as the VHP and Bajrang Dal.

While Maharashtra Police personnel were seen at most of the rallies recording the speeches, no case has been filed against any of the speakers so far. T Raja Singh has been booked twice by the Maharashtra Police for hate speeches in Latur (February) and Ahmednagar (March), but those were at rallies not held under the banner of the ‘Hindu Jan Aakrosh Morcha’.

“As per Supreme Court’s guidelines, we are video recording everything that is being said at these rallies. We then listen to them thoroughly, seek legal advice from appropriate individuals and accordingly legal action is being taken,” said a senior Maharashtra Police officer.

Despite a February 3 directive by the Supreme Court that the Hindu Jan Aakrosh Morcha would only be allowed if there is “no hate speech”, the speeches at these rallies have called Muslims “unpatriotic”, whose “prime aim is to veer Hindu girls away from their religion by converting them to Islam through marriage”.

Consider these:

November 20, 2022: At the first Hindu Jan Aakrosh Morcha in Parbhani, held in the background of the outrage over the murder of Shraddha Walkar by her partner Aaftab Poonawala, the organisers said the rally was to create awareness in Hindu society about the dangers of ‘love jihad’. Local BJP functionaries and Shiv Sena Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray faction MLA Rahul Patil were among those present.

January 29, 2023: At a rally in Mumbai, open threats were issued to Muslims on issues such as the presence of mosques, alleged pandering of the state to the Waqf Board, and halal meat. Addressing the crowd at Kamgar Maidan, where the rally ended, Telangana MLA T Raja Singh, while urging Hindus to boycott goods from shops run by members of the Muslim community, said: “It is time the Hindu community stands up against the domination by these people. There’s anger in the hearts and minds of people… Our sisters and daughters are falling prey to the systematic designs of the other community.” BJP MLAs Ashish Shelar and Pravin Darekar and MPs Gopal Shetty and Manoj Kotak attended the rally.

February 27: At a rally in Vashi, Navi Mumbai, more anti-Muslim rhetoric was raised. “Oh Abdul, listen to us, these Hindu brothers have decided to boycott you starting today,” Kajal Hindustani said. BJP MLA Ganesh Naik was present at the rally.

March 12: At a rally in Mira Road, Kajal Hindustani claimed Muslim vendors laced vegetables and fruits with toxins. “Today, almost all the vendors in Shanti Nagar, Poonam Garden, Jesal Park have been occupied by jihadi vendors. Spend a little extra money and stop buying from them. Ensure the money goes to a Hindu’s house.” Bhayander Independent MLA Geeta Jain and BJP MLA Nitesh Rane were present at the rally.

Asked about the participation of BJP leaders and ministers at these protests, Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis had said in January: “In some rallies, our party workers or leaders have been present because they are also Hindus. If a rally is being organised on the problems faced by Hindus, then it is natural that these leaders may participate. But this is not an agenda of (the BJP).”

Speaking on condition of anonymity about the rallies, a senior BJP leader pointed to the changed circumstances since the party joined hands with the Eknath Shinde faction of the Shiv Sena to come to power in the state in June last year.

“Hindutva was cited as the main reason by Eknath Shinde for overthrowing the Uddhav Thackeray-led government. A message needed to be sent out that the new government will give justice to Hindus, that it listens to Hindus and works for Hindus, even more than the previous one,” he said, adding that ‘love jihad’ issues connect with a large section of women.

“He (Uddhav) will always have the advantage of being Balasaheb Thackeray’s son, but the dilemma for him will be that his leaders can neither participate in these rallies nor condemn them,” he said, while pointing out that the BJP has been raising these issues in every state. “Love jihad is a common thread across the country. What Maharashtra is witnessing now is an experiment to check whether these mobilisations will reflect in votes.”

Asked about the hate speeches at these gatherings, BJP’s Kankavli MLA Nitesh Rane, who was present at the Mira Road event on March 12, told The Indian Express that he agreed with the call for economic boycott of Muslims.

“All that money is used by them against the Hindu community. If that money is used for the prosperity of the community, no one would have an issue. But they use money in the name of terrorism, love jihad and a lot of other things against Hindus. So obviously, we had to call out to stop their economic prosperity,” Rane said.

BJP MLA Pravin Darekar, who, too, was seen at many of these rallies, said: “Hindu girls are being lured and converted… this is taking place in large numbers. There are land mafia from a particular community who grab land and make religious places. Hindu society has come together against all this.”

Besides the Morcha rallies, there have been similar rallies across Maharashtra, including the ‘Hindu Rashtra Jagruti Sabhas’ organised by the Hindu Janjagriti Samiti, a Goa-based organisation with a stated aim of establishing a “Hindu nation”. These rallies too witness inflammatory speeches.

Though the organisers of the two gatherings are different, the speakers who get called are the same – T Raja Singh, Kalicharan Maharaj and Kajal Hindustani, among others.

The main Opposition parties in the state have largely chosen to keep quiet on the Hindu Jan Aakrosh Morcha rallies. “These rallies are being organised to divert people’s attention from the real issues of inflation, price rise and unemployment. Why should we engage on the agenda set by right-wing forces? We have chosen to not react to these rallies because we do not want to divert attention from economy-related issues,” said a senior Congress leader, who asked not to be named.

Highest, lowest margins of victory

Assembly elections

2014

The highest and lowest margins of victory in the assembly elections, 2014
From: Oct 1, 2019: The Times of India

See graphic:

The highest and lowest margins of victory in the assembly elections, 2014

Lok Sabha

2024

P.Ambedkar’s VBA received more votes than the victory margin in 4 seats

Vaibhav Ganjapure, June 6, 2024: The Times of India

In 2024, P.Ambedkar’s VBA received more votes than the victory margin in 4 Maharashtra seats
From: Vaibhav Ganjapure, June 6, 2024: The Times of India

Nagpur: The Prakash Ambedkar-led Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) did not win anywhere in Maharashtra, but in at least four seats, it got more votes than the winning margin of BJP and its allies.


Though it saw a significant loss in vote share compared to 2019, votes polled by VBA thus impacted the prospects of Congress and allies in Akola, Buldhana, Hatkanangle, and Mumbai North-West. Mahayuti’s tally of 18 may have further dipped to 14 in the event of a pact between MVA and Ambedkar, say experts. Congress and its allies in Maharashtra had held several rounds of negotiations with Ambedkar, but he had held firm on his demand for six seats.


“We are doing a post-mortem on our poll defeat and will issue a statement to the media in a couple of days. All our candidates suffered this time. We were always ready to join MVA, but they refused to grant us a minimum number of seats to contest. We suggested just six seats, where our chance of winning was more, but they offered us just Akola and Mumbai North. So, we decided to fight on our own,” Ambedkar told.


In 2019, VBA, which has a pro-dalit tilt, garnered over 41.3 lakh votes from the 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra. Its performance in three-cornered contests had a decisive effect in at least 10 seats. Congress and NCP candidates who lost due to the split in votes included big names like former CM Ashok Chavan, former FDA minister Rajendra Shingane and Ambedkar himself, who finished second from Akola.


Compared to 2014, when VBA candidates contested on just four seats and secured a total vote share of 0.75%, the party’s share in 2019 had spiralled to 14.75%. In 2024, its vote share has plunged to just 0.24% as it secured 15.79 lakh votes.


On his poll strategy for the assembly polls later this year, the VBA chief said they would take a call on an alliance after analysing the situation.
Majority VBA candidates finished at third, fourth and fifth position in the 38 seats it contested, including Ambedkar himself, who finished third with 2.76 lakh votes in Akola. The party’s support base comprises Buddhist, Dalit, and minority communities. BJP’s Anup Dhotre won the seat by over 40,000 votes against Congress candidate Dr Abhay Patil. In Mumbai Northwest, where VBA’s Parmeshwar Ranshur received 10,052 votes, Mahayuti candidate Ravindra Waikar emerged a winner by the lowest margin in this election.

Maratha quota

2024: legislature approves 10% quota

Priyanka Kakodkar, February 21, 2024: The Times of India

Mumbai:In a third such attempt in a decade, Maharashtra legislature unanimously passed a bill giving 10% quota to the politically influential Maratha community in govt jobs and educational institutions, including those in the private sphere, barring minority institutions. Those from the creamy layer will be excluded.


CM Eknath Shinde govt introduced the bill on the basis of “social and education backwardness” of the Maratha community established through a survey conducted under Maharashtra State Backward Class Commission. The state faces LS and assembly polls this year.


Meanwhile, activist Manoj Jarange said the reservation should be categorised under OBC rather than as an independent classification and insisted on extending it to blood relatives of Marathas who don’t have a valid caste identity through a separate notification.

Maratha quota bill set to be challenged in court

Maha’s Caste Quotas Are At 52%, Will Now Go Up To 62%

Govt has given us a separate reservation which crosses 50% ceiling and which does not stand the scrutiny of law, said Manoj Jarange. Opposition leaders said they are sceptical whether the bill will stand legal scrutiny.


The bill is set to be challenged in court like the two previous legislations since it will breach the 50% cap on caste-based quotas set by Supreme Court. The state’s caste reservations are currently at 52% and will shoot up to 62% once the legislation is enacted.


In addition, the state has a 10% quota for economically weaker sections in accordance with the central legislation. However, this is open to all communities that do not have a quota.


Significantly, Marathas will not be able to avail of EWS reservation once the latest quota is in force. Currently, Marathas are the biggest beneficiaries of the EWS quota and got 84% of govt jobs between 2019 and 2022.


Defending the breach of cap, Shinde said reservations in 22 states had crossed 50%. “In Tamil Nadu and Bihar, reservations are 69%, in Haryana it is 67%, in Rajasthan it is 64% and in West Bengal it is 55%,” he said.


Explaining how govt arrived at the quota, deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis said, “We had to keep in mind the observations in the survey report and the previous rulings of the courts.”


Calling the passage of the bill historic, Shinde said it was a victory for the Maratha community and that he had fulfilled a promise made just three months earlier in front of the statue of Chhatrapati Shiva ji.


“I am the son of an ordinary Maratha farmer. I understand their pain. We have worked hard to ensure that the quota is given in a manner that will last and without hurting quota of other com- munities,” he said. Shinde said govt had worked nonstop for 150 days to ensure that the bill would not face legal hurdles.


MSBCC’s report said the community was inadequately represented in public services and education and entitled to reservation in the light of “ex- ceptional circumstances”.


The survey, which examined 1.6 crore families across the state in just nine days, said Marathas were 28% of the total population. It said 21% of Maratha families in the survey were below the poverty line compared to 18% of open category families. The report said the noncreamy layer of the Maratha community was 84%. It also found that 94% of the farmers who committed suicide in the state were Marathas.
It said that a large section of the community had “suffered abject poverty for a decade” since its main source of income was agriculture, which was in distress. It was also poorly represented in secondary school and graduate and postgraduate education, the report said.


Both the survey report and the bill emphasise that the Maratha quota is distinct from the OBC quota. The Ma- ratha quota agitation triggered a backlash from the more populous OBC community, BJP’s main vote bank.


The report states, “The backwardness of the Maratha community is distinct and different from backward classes and more particularly OBCs in the sense that it is more pervasive in terms of its coverage, it is differed in its penetration and further regressive in its character.” The bill says, “For the removal of doubts, it is hereby declared that nothing in this act shall affect the reservation provided to OBCs.”


Meanwhile, Shinde said govt had received six lakh objections to the draft notification which allows blood relatives of Kunbi record holders to be given Kunbi caste certificates. “These objections are being examined. We appeal to Manoj Jarange to be patient while the legal process is being followed,” he said.

NCP- BJP relations

Til July 2023

by Alok Deshpande, July 8, 2023: The Indian Express

While Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) supremo Sharad Pawar perhaps never expected it to blow up to this, his party’s openness towards the BJP – if not flirtation with it — has never really been a secret in Maharashtra.

Having rebelled against Pawar Senior along with 31 NCP MLAs and become part of the BJP government in the state, Ajit Pawar has been pointing to this history of the NCP’s dalliance with the BJP, pooh pooing criticism of it as hypocritical.

Those who know the NCP well point to a simple truth, which is one pointer to where the party stands now: that between its formation in 1999, after splitting from the Congress, and 2014, the NCP was never out of power in the state.

It has been nearly a decade since — barring the three years that the NCP was in the Maha Vikas Aghadi coalition government – with no guarantee of a return in 2024.

Soon after Pawar rebelled against the Congress over Sonia Gandhi’s leadership and formed the NCP in 1999, the Maratha leader was offered a role in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) by its leader and Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee — as mentioned by Pawar in his autobiography Lok Maze Sangati (People are my Companions).

He refused the offer, joined hands with the Congress for the Maharashtra Assembly elections soon after, but ensured that his cordial relationship with Vajpayee and the BJP continued. This survived even after the UPA came to power in 2004, dislodging Vajpayee, with Pawar a key leader in the Manmohan Singh government.

Pawar also mentions in his autobiography that during the UPA government, he took the initiative to set up a channel of communication between then Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and the Congress-led Union government that was bitterly opposed to him.

For the BJP, tying up with the NCP is only win-win, with the party having allied with several regional parties across states over the years, which do not share its Hindutva ideology. The list includes the Peoples Democratic Party in Jammu and Kashmir, JD(U), Trinamool Congress, DMK, JD(S) in Karnataka, the TDP in Andhra Pradesh, and the Akali Dal in Punjab. This has helped the party gain an entry in states where it had minuscule presence.

In Maharashtra, as long as it had an alliance with the Shiv Sena, particularly when the latter was at its height under the late Bal Thackeray, the BJP never felt the need for another ally. With that alliance breaking, and the Sena split, the NCP was always the next best option for the BJP.

What also makes the NCP an attractive partner for the BJP is that the party has powerful leaders who are seen to command voter loyalty in their respective constituencies irrespective of party allegiance. An elected constituent of the NCP brings along a large chunk of voters.

That was not the case with the BJP’s Sena ally Eknath Shinde, for example, who had failed to win over Sena cadres to his faction.

On paper now, the alliance of the NCP and Sena factions with the BJP – a mix of regional and national – outweighs the MVA when it comes to both the Lok Sabha and Assembly polls.

NCP leaders hope to return to power, key to retaining their voter base – and get around inquiries by Central agencies against many of them.

In his first address to supporters after his rebellion, Ajit said that back in 2014, the NCP and BJP first considered the possibility of a coalition. At the time, miffed with the then Congress-led government of Prithviraj Chavan, the NCP and Congress had decided to fight the Lok Sabha elections separately. With the BJP and Shiv Sena – post Bal Thackeray’s death and Narendra Modi’s rise – also drifting apart, discussions were held between the NCP and BJP, as per Ajit.

“In the run-up to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, a proposal was mooted for the NCP, Shiv Sena and BJP to contest together, with each party contesting 16 seats. The BJP later backed out of this due to reservations of some leaders. Some like Nitin Gadkari were keen, but local BJP leaders objected,” Ajit said Wednesday.

According to him, in 2017, the two parties again approached each other. “But the BJP was not willing to leave the Shiv Sena. And our leaders said we will not go with the Shiv Sena since it’s a ‘communal’ party.”

How then, Ajit asked, did the same Shiv Sena become okay in 2019, when “we were asked to join hands with it” to form the MVA.

The NCP rebel leader and newly sworn in Maharashtra Deputy CM also repeated that his surprise oath-taking ceremony in the early hours of 2019 for a coalition government with the BJP was part of his uncle Sharad Pawar’s plan.

“Five meetings had taken place at the residence of a prominent businessman of the country. Senior BJP and NCP leaders were present. The decision was taken and I was asked to go (for the swearing-in). Later, everything was rolled back and we went with the Shiv Sena,” Ajit said.

Again, he said, in 2022, when the Shiv Sena split and the MVA government teetered, the NCP was in favour of joining hands to be in government with the BJP. “A meeting had taken place… I have a letter with the signatures of all the MLAs,” he said. But then the BJP eventually tied up with the Sena faction led by Eknath Shinde.

Ajit raised question marks on Sharad Pawar’s way of doing politics, of keeping multiple cards in play and keeping allies second-guessing, only to push his own politics. He pointed fingers at the entire drama surrounding Pawar Senior’s resignation. “He told me he wanted to resign and look after the various institutions he has set up. He told me he was planning to set up a committee of senior NCP leaders, including me, which would appoint Supriya Sule as party president. We accepted this proposal. However, a few days later, he withdrew his resignation. What was the point of resigning if you had planned to withdraw it later?” Ajit asked.

The question on everyone’s lips then is, how much did Sharad Pawar know, particularly given the long rope he gave to Ajit. And can the veteran, once celebrated as a man with friends across all parties, retain those friendships now?

Renaming places

2023: Aurangabad, Osmanabad

TNN, Sep 17, 2023: The Times of India

Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar: Aurangabad and Osmanabad districts in Maharashtra’s Marathwada region will now be known as Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar and Dharashiv, respectively. The announcement came just a few hours before the state cabinet’s special meeting on Marathwada in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar on Saturday. Speaking to reporters, chief minister Eknath Shinde said the state government had fulfilled the long-pending demand of renaming these two places in the Marathwada region.


The decision evoked sharp criticism from those opposing the decision. Hashim Osmani, who has already challenged the move in the Bombay high court, said it was outrageous that the state government has no respect for the judiciary.

Rivals in politics fixed through government agencies

As in 2022 March

Alka Dhupkar, March 25, 2022: The Times of India

One doubts if officers of the Central Bureau of Investigation, the Enforcement Directorate and the Income Tax Department in Maharashtra and the anti-corruption unit of the state’s own police force were ever so busy.

Politicians of every hue – the Congress, the NCP, the Shiv Sena and the BJP – and their uncles and aunties are currently being investigated for land grabs, bank scams, illegal constructions and forgery.

And that is not all, multiple police officers are under the scanner too. While it may not be mentioned in the charge-sheets against them, the cops’ main crime is that they chose to side with a particular political party.

This free-for-all would have been funny if the joke was not on the people of the state. Every single of these agencies – state and Central – was set up to serve the state’s tax-paying citizens. But here they are – dancing to the tunes of their political masters.

Some months ago, a bunch of Shiv Sainiks, in a move reminiscent of their street-fighting days, put up a banner on the ED office in south Mumbai identifying it as BJP Headquarters.

That was a nice move. But the fact remains that the ruling Shiv Sena and its alliance partners – the Congress and the NCP – are also using the state machinery to go after its political rivals.

Here is a look at who from which party is being probed for what:

Nationalist Congress Party

Nawab Malik

Cabinet minister for minority development and skill development

Charges: Money laundering, underworld links

Agency: Enforcement Directorate (ED)

NCP's Nawab Malik was arrested on February 23 in connection with an alleged money laundering case with links to fugitive terrorist Dawood Ibrahim. The minister will remain in jail till April 4.

Prajakt Tanpure

Minister of state for urban development; energy; higher and technical education; tribal development; and disaster management

Charge: Money laundering

Agency: ED

Several land parcels, including 90 acres of land belonging to the erstwhile Ram Ganesh Gadkari Sahkari Sakhar Karkhana and two pieces of non-agricultural land attached. According to ED, Ram Ganesh Gadkari Sahkari Sakhar Karkhana was sold to Prasad Sugar and Allied Agro Products Ltd., a firm owned by Tanpure, for Rs 12.95 crore while the reserve price was Rs 26.32 crore.

Eknath Khadse

A former BJP leader and now a cabinet minister

Charge: Corruption

Agency: ED

Case filed against Khadse, his wife and son-in-law in 2019 for causing a loss of Rs 62 crore to the government. According to the agency, Khadse misused his official position as the Maharashtra Revenue Minister in 2016 to manipulate the market price of a piece of land in Bhosari, Pune.

Sharad Pawar and Ajit Pawar

Charge: Money laundering

Agency: ED

In September 2019, the ED booked the NCP chief and his nephew Ajit Pawar in the Maharashtra State Cooperative Bank loan scam. Sharad Pawar had threatened to walk to the ED office. He dropped the plan after the ED communicated that his presence was not required.

Anil Deshmukh Former home minister

Charge: Corruption

Agencies: CBI, ED

Deshmukh was arrested by the ED on charges of corruption levelled by former Mumbai Police Commissioner Parambir Singh. Singh had alleged Deshmukh asked Sachin Waze, a Mumbai police officer now sacked in connection with the Antilia security breach case, to extort over Rs 100 crore a month from bars and restaurants in Mumbai.

Hasan Mushrif

Member of Legislative Assembly

Charge: Money siphoned off

Agency: ED

Mushrif has been accused of siphoning off Rs 100 crore from Appasaheb Nalawade Sugar Factory in Kolhapur through a private firm allegedly owned by one of his relatives.

Shiv Sena

Shridhar Madhav Patankar

Brother-in-law of chief minister Uddhav Thackeray

Charge: Money laundering

Agency: ED

Immovable properties worth Rs 6.45 crore belonging to Patakanar, who runs Shree Saibaba Grihanirmiti Private Limited, a real estate firm, were attached on March 22. ED has alleged that Shree Saibaba Grihanirmiti laundered money through a certain Nandkishore Chaturvedi, who allegedly operated a number of shell companies.

Anil Parab

Cabinet Minister for Transport minister

Agency: Income Tax department

On March 8, raids were conducted at as many as 26 locations in multiple cities involving commercial and residential properties linked to the minister and his family. The ED claimed that dismissed assistant police inspector Sachin Vaze has revealed that Parab received crores of rupees through Nagpur’s deputy regional transport officer Bajrang Kharmate as bribe to transfer ten police officers.

Rahul Kanal and Sadanand Kadam

Shiv Sena leaders

Charge: Hawala transactions

Agency: Income Tax department

Multiple properties – both commercial and residential – belonging to Kanal and Kadam have been raided. Kanal is a close associate of Sena minister and Uddhav Thackeray’s son Aaditya Thackeray. Sadanand Kadam is the brother of senior Sena leader Ramdas Kadam, who is known for his flashy cars. Kanal is a member of BMC’s Education Committee and a trustee of Shri Sai Baba Sansthan Trust, Shirdi.

Bhavana Gawali

Member of Parliament

Charge: NGO turned into a private company

Agency: ED

A property worth Rs 3.75 crore in South Mumbai’s Nariman Point belonging to an alleged aide of Bhavana Gawali has been attached. The property is owned by Saeed Khan, one of the directors of Mahila Utkarsha Pratisthan. According to investigations, Mahila Utkarsha Pratishtan Trust, an NGO, was turned into a private company and funds siphoned off it.

Yashwant Jadhav and Yamini Jadhav

BMC Standing Committee chairperson and an MLA respectively

Charge: Unaccounted wealth

Agency: Income Tax Department

On February 25, the Directorate General of Income Tax (Mumbai) raided 35 offices and residential premises belonging to Shiv Sena leader and BMC’s Standing Committee Chairman Yashwant Jadhav and his family, including his wife MLA Yamini Jadhav. Documents allegedly linking the couple to ‘benami’ properties worth Rs 130 crore were seized.

Pratap Sarnaik

Member of Legislative Council

Charge: Kickbacks

Agency: ED

ED has alleged that the Shiv Sena leader received kickbacks worth over Rs 7 crore from Tops Group – a private security agency – for facilitating a contract worth Rs 175 crore with the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA).

Anandrao Adsul

Member of Parliament

Charge: Bank fraud

Agency: ED

Adsul’s offices were searched in connection with the alleged Rs 980-crore fraud at City Co-operative Bank. Adsul and his son, Abhijeet, are directors at the bank. The original complaint was filed by Adsul against some bank officials. ED believes Adsul was a beneficiary of some of the loans given out by the bank.

Ravindra Waikar

Member of Legislative Assembly

Charge: Misuse of office to buy properties

Agency: ED

In December last year, Waikar was questioned after BJP leader Kirit Somaiya accused Waikar and Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray of misusing their official position to purchase properties in Alibaug in 2014. The properties, he has alleged, were later transferred to their wives, Manisha Waikar and Rashmi Thackeray. Bharatiya Janata Party

Prasad Lad

Member of Legislative Council

Charge: Criminal breach of trust

Agency: Economic Offences Wing of Mumbai Police

An FIR has been registered against Lad for criminal breach of trust and cheating in connection with a Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation contract.

Pravin Darekar

Member of Legislative Council

Charge: Cheating

Agency: Mumbai Police

The Mumbai police has accused Darekar of using bogus membership of a labour society to get elected as a director of Mumbai District Central Cooperative Bank. He is also accused of cheating the state government and causing losses to the bank. Police have said Darekar, who is a prosperous businessman, posed as a labourer to become a member of the labour society.

Mohit Kamboj

Former Youth Wing leader

Charge: Illegal constructions

Agency: BMC

The Shiv Sena-ruled BMC had issued a notice to a building ‘Khushi Pride Belmondo’ in suburban Santa Cruz where former city BJP youth wing president Mohit Kamboj lives and owns flats. A team of Mumbai civic officials recently inspected the premises to check for illegal alterations.

Chandrashekhar Bawankule

Former minister

Charge: Corruption

Agency: Economic Offences Wing (EOW) The EOW, Nagpur is investigating allegations of corruption against Bawankule when he was a cabinet minister between 2015 and 2018.

Narayan Rane

Former chief minister and currently a Union minister

Charge: Illegal construction

Agency: BMC

Rane has approached the Bombay High Court through a company owned by his family seeking quashing of notices issued by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation on February 25 and March 4 over alleged unauthorised alterations made in his Juhu bungalow.

Mumbai Police

Param Bir Singh

Former Mumbai Police Commissioner

Charge: Extortion

Agency: Mumbai police

Five cases of extortion have been registered against Singh in Maharashtra. These include one registered in April 2021 on the complaint of inspector Bhimrao Ghade, who during his stint with Thane police reported to Singh, the then Thane Commissioner. Ghadge alleged that Singh had asked him to drop charges against a person and demand money for the favour.

The latest: The CBI transferred investigations into all criminal cases lodged by the Maharashtra police against Singh to the CBI. The court said an impartial probe in necessary to regain public confidence in the system.

Rashmi Shukla

Director General, CRPF, currently posted in Hyderabad

Charge: Phone tapping

Agency: Mumbai and Pune police

Shukla was booked for allegedly having put the phone numbers of Shiv Sena member of Parliament Sanjay Raut and NCP leader Eknath Khadse under surveillance in 2019, when she was the state intelligence chief. Earlier, the Pune police had also registered an FIR against Shukla in connection with alleged illegal tapping of the phones of Congress leader Nana Patole when a BJP-led government was in power in the state.

2022 July- 2023 Mar: Thane

From Mohamed Thaver/ In CM Shinde’s bastion, 25 FIRs against political rivals in 10 months/ The Indian Express/ April 24, 2023

An analysis of FIRs registered by Thane police since Eknath Shinde became the Maharashtra Chief Minister on June 30, 2022, shows that 25 FIRs were registered against members of the Sena (UBT), the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Congress, and one FIR was against a rapper over the last 10 months. Most of the FIRs were in connection with “targeting” of Shinde by the Opposition via social media posts, comments or banners.

Eleven FIRs were initially registered against former MP Anand Paranjpe, which were eventually reduced to one after the Bombay High Court intervened. Most FIRs were registered under Section 153 (A) (promoting enmity between different groups) of the Indian Penal Code.

Only a few FIRs were filed against the Shinde Sena during the same period, including one in connection with Shinde Sena workers attacking a Bharatiya Janata Party worker. There were also two reported NCs registered against Shinde Sena members.

Roshni Shinde, a member of Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray), was allegedly manhandled by women from Eknath Shinde-led Sena in Thane on April 2. The incident was captured on CCTV and reportedly happened over a social media post insulting the Chief Minister. Two FIRs were registered against Roshni Shinde after the incident, and a non-cognisable offence (NC) was filed on her complaint. Thane Police went to court for permission to investigate her complaint on April 4.

Shiv Sena (UBT) MLA Aaditya Thackeray and Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) allies, the NCP and Congress, protested near Thane Police Commissioner’s office on April 5, alleging lopsided police action in Roshni’s case. They accused Thane police of taking orders only from the CM and claimed that Thane Police Commissioner Jaijeet Singh failed to meet Uddhav Thackeray when the latter went to meet him on April 4.

State Congress leaders, including Nana Patole, Ashok Chavan, Prithviraj Chavan, and Balasaheb Thorat, met Singh on April 12 to demand action against Shinde Sena workers for allegedly attacking Congress office-bearer Girish Koli on March 31 over a reported comment against Shinde on social media.

The Shiv Sena split of June 2022

Uddhav quits as CM; Shinde made CM, Fadnavis Dy CM

July 1, 2022: The Times of India

New Delhi/Mumbai: When Uddhav Thackeray quit as Maharashtra CM, clearing the way for BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis to return to his old job, almost everyone thought the gripping political drama would now move in a straight line. Except that a stunning turn was yet to come.


And it came when BJP decided to step aside for rebel Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde, 58, to take the wheel. Fadnavis announced he would not be part of the government, only to be directed by the BJP leadership to take oath as deputy CM.

In a day of dramatic twists, Shinde, who led a massive coup in the Sena, was sworn in as chief minister after he staked claim to form the government with BJP, and 51-year-old Fadnavis as his deputy.

Sources said the BJP leadership expects Fadnavis will be able to monitor Shinde’s activities and work towards the party’s objectives. “It was felt that if Fadnavis is not made deputy CM, it would result in a complete free hand for Shinde,” a senior leader said.

The events in a nutshell

Maharashtra, 2018-22: The Shiv Sena’s fortunes in a nutshell
From: May 12, 2023: The Times of India

See graphic:

Maharashtra, 2018-22: The Shiv Sena’s fortunes in a nutshell

Supreme Court verdict on Shiv Sena split of June 2022

Omkar Gokhale , Sadaf Modak, May 12, 2023: The Indian Express

Passing a unanimous judgement on the various issues related to the split in Shiv Sena in June 2022, the Supreme Court Thursday made strong observations about the role of the then Governor of Maharashtra and the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly. The court, however, refrained from interfering with the proceedings related to disqualifying 16 MLAs, including Chief Minister Eknath Shinde.

Here are the key takeaways from the verdict.

‘Speaker to decide disqualification’

Not intervening in the proceedings, the SC said the issue of disqualification ought to be decided as per established procedures in law and the Speaker is the appropriate authority for this under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution, which lays down the anti-defection law.

The Bench said in the present case, there were “no extraordinary circumstances” warranting the court adjudicating in the matter.

It also clarified that an MLA has the right to participate in proceedings of the House regardless of pendency of any petitions for disqualification.

‘Speaker must consider Shiv Sena constitution’

The SC said that while deciding disqualification pleas, the Speaker must consider the constitution of the Shiv Sena, which was submitted to the Election Commission (EC) with the consent of both the factions. It said that as the Tenth Schedule’s third paragraph has been removed, the ‘split’ in the party will no longer be a defence available to MLAs facing the proceedings.

Paragraph 3 of the Tenth Schedule protected defectors as long as one-third of the members of a political party formed a separate group. It was removed by the Constitution (91st Amendment) Act, 2003, which came into effect on January 1, 2004. The Court asked the Speaker to first determine which of the factions constitute the political party and take the call without being influenced by the ECI order in that regard.

The Bench said the Speaker must not decide which faction constitutes the political party on the “blind appreciation” of which group had a majority in the Assembly. “This is not a game of numbers, but of something more. The structure of leadership outside the Legislative Assembly is a consideration which is relevant to the determination of this issue,” the court stressed.

‘Governor didn’t act in accordance with law’

The court said that then Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari was not justified in calling for a floor test on June 30, 2022, as he did not have objective material to show that the incumbent government had lost the confidence of the House. The court said the Governor had acted upon an inference that a section of the Shiv Sena wished to withdraw their support to the government, even though the communication by some of the MLAs only expressed discontent about the Maha Vikas Aghadi alliance.

It said that the power of the Governor to act without the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers is of an extraordinary nature, and must be exercised with circumspection within the limits of law. It also said that the Governor is not empowered to enter the political arena and play a role in inter or intra party disputes.

‘Can’t reinstate Uddhav govt as he resigned’

The Thackeray group had sought to restore the situation prior to June 29, 2022, seeking a ruling that Uddhav Thackeray’s government be reinstated. However, the court said Thackeray did not face the floor test on June 30 and resigned.

The SC held that despite the Governor not having reasons to reach the conclusion that Thackeray had lost the confidence of the House, it could not quash a resignation submitted voluntarily. The court said had Thackeray refrained from resigning, it could have considered a remedy to reinstate his government.

‘Appointment of whip from Shinde group illegal’

As the Shiv Sena MLAs’ rebellion was unfolding, on June 21, 2022, the party chief whip, Sunil Prabhu, issued a whip directing all the MLAs to attend a meeting at CM Uddhav Thackeray’s residence. Those in attendance passed a resolution to remove Eknath Shinde as Group Leader of its legislative party.

The Shinde-led faction then issued its own resolution, removing Prabhu as the whip and appointing Bharat Gogawale in his place. After assuming office, Speaker Rahul Narvekar recognised Gogawale as the whip. The SC said the Speaker did not attempt to identify which of the two persons were authorised by the political party, adding the Speaker should have conducted an independent inquiry based on the rules of the party.

It deemed the Speaker’s decision recognising Gogawale as the whip to be illegal, as he had not verified if it was the decision of the political party.

‘Legislature party, political party distinct’

While the Shinde-led faction argued that the legislature party and the political party are inextricably intertwined, the court said the two could not be conflated.

The court said that as per provisions of the Representation of the People Act, an association of individuals calling itself a political party has to be registered with the EC.

The court said that Parliament had recognised the independent existence of a legislature party to the limited extent of providing a defence to actions of legislators of the political party. For instance, the freedom of expression of legislators in the House, or intra-party dissent, cannot fall within the purview of anti-defection laws.

The court said that a whip interacts with members of the legislature party to communicate the directions of the political party. It held that “it is the political party and not the legislature party which appoints the Whip and the Leader of the party in the House”.

Therefore, it said the Speaker must recognise only the whip and leader who are duly recognised by the political party.

‘Speaker and EC can adjudicate issues concurrently’

The court said it could not accept the Thackeray group’s contention that the EC was barred from deciding on the party symbol dispute until the Speaker decided the disqualification pleas before him.

The court said this would amount to “indefinitely staying proceedings before the ECI”, as the Speaker’s decision would attain finality only after the appeals against his decision were disposed of.

Referral of Nabam Rebia case to larger bench

The five-judge Bench referred certain issues related to its 2016 judgment in the Nabam Rebia case to a larger Bench. One of the issues is whether a notice for removal of a Speaker would restrict the powers of the Speaker to issue disqualification notices to MLAs.

Shinde’s is the ‘real’ Sena: Speaker

Shinde’s the ‘real’ Sena: Speaker; but doesn’t disqualify any MLA

Narwekar ‘Relied On Party Statute, House Majority’

Chaitanya.Marpakwar@timesgroup.com


Mumbai : While not disqualifying any legislator from rival factions of Shiv Sena led by CM Eknath Shinde and Uddhav Thackeray, Maharashtra assembly speaker Rahul Narwekar, in his verdict in Sena MLAs’ case, held on Wednes day that Shinde’s faction was “the real Shiv Sena”. Narwekar dismissed all 34 disqualification petitions filed before him against 54 Sena legislators — 40 of Shinde group and 14 of Thackeray camp.


The verdict comes as another big setback for Team Udd hav, though it has the consolation of knowing its MLAs will stay, and means Shinde emerges stronger with government led by him looking stable. Narwekar said he relied on three major things to reach his conclusion: Shiv Sena’s constitution, party’s lea dership structure, and its legislative majority. Supreme Court had in May asked Narwekar to decide on pleas for disqualification and, among other things, determine prima facie which was the party.

Uddhav to move SC; Shinde: Sena not pvt property

Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray said his party will move SC against the Speaker’s decision as apex court guidelines were ignored. The original case was about disqualification under the anti defection law, but not one lawmaker from either side was disqualified, he said.


CM Shinde said, “Verdict signals end of dynastic politics. A political party is not someone’s private property. As I said from the beginning, we have the majority and in a democracy that is what matters.”


While Sharad Pawar said the Speaker’s wording would make case stronger for Uddhav in SC, nephew Ajit, who split NCP to become deputy CM, expects to get similar relief from the speaker.

Shinde, Gogawale Validly Appointed: Speaker

‘Uddhav Had No Power To Remove Shinde After 2022 Mutiny In Ranks’

Speaker Narwekar went into detail into Sena’s constitution, saying the 1999 document submitted to the EC was a valid one and that the Thackeray group’s contention that the amended constitution of 2018 should be relied on was not acceptable.


Narwekar held June 21, 2022 as the date when rival Sena factions emerged and were brought on record before the Speaker’s office on June 22. He said no organisational elections were held in 2013 and 2018. Narwekar said Uddhav (who was CM in the MVA government) had no power to remove Shinde following a mutiny in Sena ranks in June2022.


Uddhav’s faction had claimed that the paksha pramukh’s decision was synonymous with the party’s will and in case of any rift in the leader ship structure, the decision of the ‘paksha pramukh’ constituted the will of the party.


Narwekar said, “Shiv Sena’s constitution doesn’t have a post called ‘paksha pramukh’ and he doesn’t have absolute power, this power rests with the ‘rashtriya karyakarini’ (national executive). The ‘paksha pramukh’ has no absolute power and this power has to be exercised in consultation with the national executive.”


Narwekar said the Shinde faction had an overwhelming majority of 37 of 55 MLAs when rival camps emerged on June 21. He said Sunil Prabhu (of Uddhav group) had ceased to be the party’s legal whip on June 21 and had no authority to call a meeting of the party.


“The will of ‘paksha pramukh’ at the time cannot be said to be the will of the political party. This is to enable intra-party dissent… and Sena’s party structure doesn’t allow any forum to express dissent or dissatisfaction,” Narwekar said. He noted that “Eknath Shinde was validly appointed leader of Shiv Sena in the assembly” and “Bharat Gogawale was validly appointed as chief whip”.


The Speaker said Prabhu “failed to establish the service of whip” & said a comparison of original attendance sheet, produced with the (UBT Sena) affidavit which had a copy of the sheet, revealed the two do not match. “There are glaring discrepancies,” he said. The first ground on which the UBT faction sought disqualification was the Shinde faction had “become incommunicado”. The Speaker said this was amere allegation and UBT faction had not put forth any evidence to substantiate it. He said the Shinde faction MLAs had met Milind Narwekar and Ravindra Phatak, both sent by Thackeray, in Surat.


The Uddhav group MLAs also could not be disqualified as the Shinde faction could not issue whips following the due process, the Speaker held.
Narwekar said there was no consensus on which of the constitutions of the Shiv Sena was valid. So he relied on the constitution provided by EC. While Narwekar upheld the 2018 leadership structure presented by the Uddhav faction as valid, he held it was not in conformity with the 1999constitution. “All the petitions seeking disqualification of MLAs are rejected,” he ruled. Narwekar also dismissed the disqualification petitions against two independent MLAs and Bacchu Kadu of Prahar Janshakti Party.

Women

1962-2014: Women MLAs

Bhavika Jain1, Sep 28, 2019: The Times of India

1962-2014: Women MLAs in the Maharashtra assembly.
From: Bhavika Jain1, Sep 28, 2019: The Times of India

Women comprise nearly 50% of the total voter base in Maharashtra and yet represent just 7% of the current Vidhan Sabha strength.

Of the 288 seats of the Maharashtra assembly, 20 are occupied by women today. This abysmal figure, though, is still a record for the highest number of women MLAs in the state.

An analysis of women’s representation in the Maharashtra Vidhan Sabha shows that while female voters are increasing steadily, parties are still shying away from fielding women as candidates.

In the 2014 elections, of the total 4,119 candidates in the fray, 277 were women, 20 of whom won. This is still an improvement over 2009, when there were just 11 women in Vidhan Bhavan; 211 women had contested then.

“We have been agitating within the party, even though multiple forums have been seeking more tickets for women. They talk about winnability but if parties don’t allow women to contest, how can they prove that they can win elections? It’s still a male-dominated space,” said BJP spokesperson Shaina NC. She said handing out tickets to daughters, wives or daughters-in-law of senior male politicians does not do justice to women workers.

A senior woman politician said though the number of women voters is rising, there is a question over how many choose a candidate on their own and are not influenced by the political views of their husbands and sons. “The day a woman’s vote is not influenced by her male relatives and she votes for a female candidate putting her trust in her to raise her issues, that’s when parties will be forced to give equal representation to women,” said the politician who has served for 25 years.

In 1972, there was not a single woman MLA in Maharashtra. Of the 56 women who contested not one won, even though there were 1.3 crore women voters, of whom 71.3 lakh voted. In 1967, nine of the 19 women candidates won. Likewise, in 1962, 13 of 36 women candidates won. Over the past four assembly elections from 1995 to 2009, only 11 to 12 women were elected in each term. The highest number till 2014 was 19 in 1980 or 6.6% of the total strength.

“The is a need for parties to give more opportunities to women working with them,” said Yashomati Thakur, a Congress secretary and MLA from Teosa. She said there is only one woman with a cabinet rank in the state government—Pankaja Munde. “This says a lot,” she said.

YEAR-WISE DEVELOPMENTS

2018

Sena backs Cong for by- poll

Prafulla Marpakwar, Sena backs Congman for Maha bypoll, May 11, 2018: The Times of India

Shiv Sena has supported the candidature of a Congress nominee, Vishwajeet Kadam, for the May 28 Pulus-Kadegaon assembly bypoll. The BJP has fielded Sangram Deshmukh.

Sena said it was a gesture by party chief Uddhav Thackeray since Kadam is the son of late senior Congressman Patangrao Kadam. “It’s a tradition of the Sena. Whenever the son or daughter of a deceased legislator contests a bypoll, Sena lends support,” said a party spokesman.

Maharashtra legislative council biennial elections

BJP & Sena win 2 seats each, NCP 1 in MLC polls, May 25, 2018: The Times of India

The results of the Maharashtra legislative council biennial elections, 2018
From: BJP & Sena win 2 seats each, NCP 1 in MLC polls, May 25, 2018: The Times of India

The BJP and Sena bagged 2 seats each and the NCP picked up 1 seat in the Maharashtra legislative council in the biennial elections. Counting of votes has been deferred in 1 constituency.

The Raigad-RatnagiriSindhudurg seat was won by NCP candidate Aniket Tatkare, son of former minister and NCP heavyweight Sunil Tatkare, by defeating Sena’s Rajiv Sable. Aniket secured 620 votes against Sable’s 306. In the Amravati seat, minister of state (industries and environment) Pravin Pote secured 458 of the 488 votes polled. Congress nominee Anil Madhogadhiya managed to get 17 votes. “I thank all the voters for reposing their faith in me.

It is avote to the leadership of BJP in the state and at the Centre,” Pote said. In Wardha-Chandrapur -Gadchiroli, the tussle was close between BJP’s Ambatkar, who bagged 528 votes, and the Congress nominee Indrakumar Saraf, who got 491 votes. In the the Parbhani-Hingoli local self-governing body constituency election, the Shiv Sena sprang a surprise despite the numbers favouring the Congress-NCP combine.

Viplav Bajoriya of Shiv Sena defeated Suresh Deshmukh of Congress by a margin of 35 votes in the local selfgoverning body constituency election for Parbhani-Hingoli districts with the help of crossvoting. Viplav, who is the son of Sena’s sitting MLC Gopikisan Bajoriya from Akola-Buldhana-Washim local bodies’ constituency, secured 256 votes as against 221 received by Deshmukh. BJP’s plans to take on Shiv Sena in the Nashik local selfgoverning bodies constituency polls failed miserably.

Despite being its ally, BJP had decided to vote against the Sena and back the NCP candidate. The move was seen as a retaliatory step since Sena had fielded a candidate for the Palghar Lok Sabha bypolls.

Shiv Sena candidate Narendra Darade defeated NCP nominee Shiva-ji Sahane by a margin of 167 votes. Meanwhile, the Election Commission has deferred counting in the Osmanabad-Latur-Beed seat over legal wrangles.

The deadlock over counting of votes for the election continued on Thursday, when the Aurangabad bench of the Bombay high court scheduled the hearing of review petition in the matter before the regular bench on June 6

2019

Adani-hosted dinner

Nov 15, 2024: The Times of India

Mumbai: Two days after Ajit Pawar said industrialist Gautam Adani was part of political talks that took place between BJP and the undivided Sharad Pawar-led NCP in 2019, NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar said that the meeting, where he was present, was held at Adani’s residence in New Delhi. He, however, added that Adani hosted the dinner but “was not participating in the politicaldiscussions.”


Pawar Senior made these remarks in an interview with The News Minute-Newslaundry. He said that apart from him, those present were Adani, Amit Shah, and Ajit Pawar. The power-sharing talks took place before Ajit Pawar’s early morning swearing-in as deputy chief minister, with Devendra Fadnavis as CM, to form a govt that lasted barely 80 hours.


Pawar Senior was quoted by the news portal as saying that his NCP colleagues, many of whom faced cases from Central agencies, told him they had been assured that if they joined hands with BJP, the cases would go away. Pawar, according to the report, said he pushed back as he was not convinced that BJP would keep its promise, but his colleagues said “why not hear it from the horse’s mouth” and that was how he found himself at a dinner at Adani’s residence, with Amit Shah present.


Referring to the meeting, Ajit Pawar had said, “It has been five years, everyone knows where the meeting happened, it was in Delhi at a businessman’s house, everyone knows it. Yes, there were five meetings… Amit Shah was there, Gautam Adani was there, Praful Patel was there, Devendra Fadnavis was there, Ajit Pawar was there, Pawar Saheb was there… All were there... Everything was decided.” He had further said, “Blame for it has fallen on me, and I have taken it. I took blame and made others safe.”When he was asked why Pawar Senior had later hesitated and not gone with BJP, Ajit had said he didn’t know.

“Pawar Saheb is a leader whose mind no one in the world can read. Not even our aunty (Sharad Pawar’s wife Pratibha) or our Supriya (Sule),” he had said.
Meanwhile, Sharad Pawar on Thursday visited Chinchwad assembly constituency in Pune district to campaign for his party’s candidate, Rahul Kalate, who is contesting against BJP’s Shankar Jagtap in the Maharashtra elections on Nov 20. Pawarcriticised the current govt, stating that Maharashtra has “fallen into the wrong hands” in recent years, resulting in a decline and stagnation in development.

Assembly elections: How a ‘no-contest’ became a strong contest

Vaibhav Purandare & Ambarish Mishra, Oct 26, 2019: The Times of India

At the height of the assembly poll campaign, CM Devendra Fadnavis invoked the Fuhrer-like mustachioed jailer from the 1975 Bollywood classic ‘Sholay’ with his “angrezon ke zamaney ke” pretensions. NCP chief “Sharad Pawar is like this jailer, saying “ Aadhe idhar jaao, aadhe udhar jaao, bache woh mere peechhe aao(Half the cops can move here, the other half there and the rest, stand behind me),” the CM said, recalling actor Asrani’s famous line.

Portraying the poll as not just an unequal contest but a non-contest didn’t cut much ice with Maharashtra’s voters, who placed the BJP-Sena alliance across the winning line for sure but not before making it clear that this was no one-horse race.

The hype around the “220-plus” target set by the BJP-Sena combine has understandably triggered odd reactions after the results: the saffron winners are shaken and in a sulk; the “defeated” NCP and Congress are in a celebratory mood.

This part-setback for the ‘yuti’ and bounceback for NCP-Congress brings in its wake the prospect of a possible erosion of authority and clout for CM Devendra Fadnavis and Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, both of whom had publicly stated that the saffron camp had no opponents worth the name.

In the run-up to the polls, many of Pawar’s closest aides deserted him more swiftly than did the gaonwale ofSholay when Gabbar’s men came calling on their scary horses, but the strategy of engineering defections of netas it had once described as tainted and unruly fief-holders significantly diluted BJP’s anti-corruption narrative. At the same time it sparked largescale rebellion, with Fadnavis unable to rein in the rebels despite issuing a stern warning at a presser that those who didn’t withdraw from the fray “would be shown their place”.

Moreover, it nullified gains that may have accrued from the Maratha quota the Fadnavis government granted the state’s nearly 30% Maratha population. If the Marathas of western Maharashtra and Marathwada welcomed the fulfilment of their demand, they looked askance at the targeting of Pawar right through the campaign.

Farm distress, the overall state of the rural economy and the aftermath of the floods made BJP all the more vulnerable to anti-incumbency in western Maharashtra, allowing Pawar to accuse it of sidestepping local issues.

Similar charges were hurled by the opposition in the arid Marathwada. However, Fadnavis’s slogan of a drought-free Maharashtra carried the day.

It would be oversimplification to state that the nationalist narrative did not yield results for the ruling party, because most urban areas — except Fadnavis’s hometown Nagpur — sided strongly with the saffron parties and two important regions, Marathwada and Konkan, firmly expressed support for BJP-Sena rule.

The clear takeaway for Sena is that it cannot play ruling ally and opposition at the same time for long. BJP has successfully entered its bastion, the coastal Konkan stretch. Sena’s strike rate across the state is 20% less than that of the Modi-Shah-Fadnavis party (44% as against BJP’s 64%), and BJP is also clearly No. 1 in Mumbai and the wider Mumbai Metropolitan Region for the second time running, having won 16 seats (as against 14 for Uddhav’s party) in the city of Sena’s birth despite having contested fewer seats.

For NCP, it may have helped that long-time “fief-holders” made an exit, allowing some of the alleged “taint” to wash off and for new blood to come in. The ED action against Pawar and Praful Patel enabled the party to come together by invoking “cooperation and not coercion” as the overriding principle of Maharashtra’s politics, the word “cooperation” carrying deep resonance in the western Indian region that built and nurtured the ‘sahakar’ movement.

With the unrelenting onslaught on his strongholds by BJP, Pawar and his party tried to remind their loyal voters of this status and acquired room to project the poll as a straight duel between the BJP brass and the NCP founder.

Why BJP, Sena alliance ended

Nov 12, 2019: The Times of India

Key Highlights

Following poll results, Sena’s continued intransigence was not anticipated

BJP’s view was that succumbing to pressure tactics would seriously undermine its credibility

The party also took a rather hard stance on portfolios and ministerial berths

NEW DELHI: Shiv Sena’s demand for a 50:50 share in ministerial berths, and more so the quest of a “rotational” chief minister, surprised BJP but was in keeping with the steadily deteriorating relations between the Hindutva allies that had eroded trust to the point of constant suspicion. Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray’s remarks following the results that the numbers should “open everyone’s eyes” and that he was prepared to “wait” till a satisfactory arrangement was worked out had an ominous ring. While Sena’s continued intransigence was not anticipated, BJP decided that it would not give in to demands.

BJP’s view was that succumbing to pressure tactics would seriously undermine its credibility. With Sena’s numbers adding to only a little over half that of BJP, sharing the CM’s post was ruled out. The party also took a rather hard stance on portfolios and ministerial berths.

BJP recognised Sena’s bid to restore parity after having lost the leading role in the 2014 assembly elections. The BJP leadership was, however, not prepared to yield ground, perhaps defying expectations that it would be under pressure to form a government. The party decided not to press for negotiations and instead waited it out as the date marking the end of the current assembly approached. The positions of the two parties hardened and the distrust of recent years gained the upper hand as BJP-Sena relations headed south.

While the saffron alliance won a majority, BJP’s under-performance opened a chasm. The anger in BJP ranks is palpable as it is felt that the party gave away too many seats to its partner. The events of the last three weeks indicate that the alliance is unlikely to be repaired. In the unlikely event of the two parties coming together again, the trust factor will be all but missing.

Nov: The uncertainty after the Assembly elections

Oct 24- Nov 28: A summary

Nov 28, 2019: The Times of India

Sharad Pawar’s role

Ambarish Mishra, Nov 23, 2019: The Times of India

1978 once more?

Pawar play sees rainbow coalition

NCP president Sharad Pawar’s cautious optimism and ability to bridge political divides stood out as the Congress-NCPShiv Sena coalition was finally sealed, underscoring his role as the state’s most influential politician.

A key NCP functionary pointed out that Pawar had kept his word, recalling a poll rally in Maharashtra last month where the former Union minister and three-time CM had said he would go home only after “sending them (the BJP) packing”. “In less than a month, Pawar has ousted BJP from power in a bloodless coup that will have far-reaching impact on state politics,” the NCP functionary said, adding, “Pawarsaheb has emerged the real winner in the assembly polls.”

Now his administrative acumen and crisis-management skills are expected to stand him in good stead while he tries to keep the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress alliance on an even keel, said observers.

Days after the poll results, even though it became apparent that Uddhav Thackeray was unlikely to give in to BJP, Pawar had kept his counsel. For nearly a week, Pawar maintained that his party was content to playing a “constructive” role as the Opposition. However, he kept open a line of communication with Shiv Sena through friend and admirer Sanjay Raut. So while Thackeray stepped up his rhetoric against BJP, Pawar began to cajole Congress into joining an alliance. Soon, he was flitting between Mumbai and Delhi, holding talks with Sonia Gandhi and other Congress leaders.

At one stage, it looked as if Sonia would continue to hew close to the party’s line on “ideological incompatibility” with Sena. Unfazed, he got down to finetuning a power-sharing formula and a draft of the common minimum programme, which, he was shrewd enough to know, would find favour with the state Congress.

Again, past experience came to his help. On board the Progressive Democratic Front alliance, which he cobbled to oust Congress Party from power in circa 1978, were disparate political elements like the Jan Sanghis and dyed-inthe-wool Socialists. However, Pawar managed the balance of power with the exquisite skill of an Ikebana expert.

Pictures of the aging warhorse — he will turn 80 next month — addressing a meeting in Satara amid rains went viral and became the defining image of the 2019 polls. The rest, as they say, is history.

Uddhav Thackeray’s role

Ambarish Mishra, Nov 23, 2019: The Times of India

He turned saffron Sena ‘secular’, and emerged as king

Matoshree watchers said even in his wildest dreams, Uddhav Thackeray would hardly have thought of the Shiv Sena chief minister passing through the gilded gates of Mantralaya, the high seat of the government and a Byzantine world of files and fatwas, flanked by NCP-Congress ministers, to revive the Gandhi-Nehru legacy in the state.

They further added that Thackeray would scarcely believe that it is he who has brought about the classic U-turn in state politics: the Sena shifting from saffron to secular, and NCPCongress bigwigs accepting Thackeray as their seniormost partner. A former Sena minister said, “All credit to Uddhavji for breaking the jinx in Maharashtra politics by sealing an alliance with the NCP-Congress. Also, he deserves praise for cutting BJP, which wields unbridled power in the country, to size. Uddhavji truly displayed the fighting spirit of Balasaheb Thackeray in his own quiet way.”

Close friends said Balasaheb’s son, now 59, is made of sterner stuff, but refuses to put his political muscles on display. “He may lack Balasaheb’s charisma, but he can correctly read the political situation,” said an associate. “Uddhav has proved wrong his detractors who had predicted a vertical split in the Sena after Balasaheb’s death in 2012. Well, the Sena is going strong,” he added.

Thackeray couldn’t have chosen a better moment to snap ties with BJP, others said. The saffron alliance was growing stale, and Sena needed a makeover to keep pace with the changing times. Also, Uddhav’s dream of installing a Shiv Sena CM in Mantralaya appeared to be in tatters as BJP rejected Matoshree’s 50:50 formula for sharing power after the state assembly elections.

An embittered Thackeray worked out a two-pronged strategy. First, he steadfastly stuck to his 50:50 formula and shunned all talks with BJP. Sources said he even got himself a new mobile to keep BJP at bay. Second, he allowed his close confidant Sanjay Raut to begin backroom talks with NCP president Sharad Pawar.

Uddhav Thackeray would now need to combine adaptability with political acumen to keep the Sena-NCP-Congress alliance going in Maharashtra for five years. He will have to think of an inclusive and secular agenda, said analysts. “We’ll have to junk our Hindutva baggage — for instance, our demand for Bharat Ratna to V D Savarkar will not go down well with Congress,” said a Sena MLA.

Sanjay Raut’s role

Ambarish Mishra, Nov 23, 2019: The Times of India

When he joined as a modest clerk in the circulation department of one of Mumbai’s leading media houses in the early 1980s, Sanjay Raut was fired by a dream to be the editor-in-chief of the group’s popular Marathi daily.

Over three decades later, Raut has emerged as a key driver for the Shiv Sena-NCPCongress alliance that is set to take off, with the coveted post going to Sena.

Raut has emerged as the Sena’s No. 2, next only to Uddhav Thackeray, in the party’s post-BJP phase. He will be the Sena’s knight in shining armour, penning editorials for Saamna, the Sena mouthpiece, and planning strategies for Thackeray should the latter decide to be the VVIP occupant of Varsha, the CM’s official residence, said political experts. “Raut takes measured but firm steps. He sets forth a goal and follows it assiduously,” said Dinesh Dukhande, a TV journalist who has been following the Sena strategist’s career graph for over a decade.

Ousting BJP from power was Raut’s goal after the recently held state assembly elections, and he pursued it with zeal. “Raut disliked BJP’s allegedly authoritarian style of functioning,” said a media watcher.

Raut stirred the ire of the Sena rank and file by writing angry editorials after BJP refused to accept Thackeray’s 50:50 formula to share power and CMship as well. Raut may be nursing political ambition, but he is shrewd enough not to trample on Matoshree’s toes.

And then, a midnight, 1978-style coup

Nov 23, 2019: The Times of India

Key Highlights

In 1978, Pawar ran the rainbow coalition comprising the Janta Party and the Peasants Workers Party that lasted less than two years

Sharad Pawar walked out with 38 Congress MLAs to form a new government called Samantar Congress (Parallel Congress). Pawar then became the youngest chief minister of the state at the age of 38

NEW DELHI: Ajit Pawar's decision to join hands with the BJP in an act of overnight rebellion bears a striking resemblance to his uncle Sharad Pawar's coup against a government formed by two Congress factions to become the state's youngest chief minister 41 years ago.

In 1978, Pawar ran the rainbow coalition comprising the Janta Party and the Peasants Workers Party that lasted less than two years. Incidentally, this time he is trying to forge a similar alliance in the state by joining hands with the Congress and the Shiv Sena.

Ajit was sworn-in as deputy chief minister on Saturday morning, only to be snubbed by Pawar who said the decision to support the BJP was not backed by him and was his nephew's personal one.

In fact, Pawar's decision in 1978 to establish his own party and run it for a decade earned him the unofficial title of "strongman" in political circles.

Pawar wrote in his book 'On My Terms' that the poll reverses in the 1977 post-Emergency anti-Indira wave shocked many in the state and the country. V N Gadgil lost on a Congress ticket in Baramati, the home turf of the Pawars.

In January, 1978 Indira Gandhi split the Congress, forming Congress (Indira) to take on the parent organisation Congress (S - headed by Sardar Swarn Singh) in the state elections. Pawar stayed with Congress (S) and his mentor Yashwantrao Chavan.

In the state assembly polls held a month later, the Congress (S) won 69 seats as against 65 of Congress (I). The Janta Party had won 99 seats. However, no party got a full majority.

The two factions of the Congress got together to form the government headed by Vasantdada Patil from Congress (S) and with Nashikrao Tirpude from Congress (I) as the Deputy Chief Minister. However, the bickering between the two Congress factions continued which made it difficult to run the government.

Pawar decided to quit. His relations with Janata Party president Chandrashekar helped him a great deal.

"You will have to play a key role in this," Chandrashekar told Pawar. Accordingly, Pawar started seeking support of the MLAs. Sushilkumar Shinde, who went on to become the state chief minister and then Union Home Minister, Datta Meghe and Sundarrao Solanke sent their resignations to the chief minister.

Pawar walked out with 38 Congress MLAs to form a new government called Samantar Congress (Parallel Congress). Pawar then became the youngest chief minister of the state at the age of 38.

The new government was a rainbow coalition of the Janta Party, Peasants Workers Party (PWP) and other smaller parties, senior journalist Anant Bagaitkar said.

When Pawar resigned, the state assembly session was on. "Even while the House was discussing supplementary demands, the government was reduced to a minority, following which chief minister Vasantdada Patil submitted his resignation," Pawar writes. However, with the return of Gandhi to power in 1980, his government was dismissed.

Political Analyst Suhas Palshikar, in a profile on the Maratha strongman titled 'A chapter named Pawar' in a Marathi magazine, writes that Pawar led the party for over a decade and returned to the parent party under the leadership of Rajiv Gandhi.

"Because he decided to establish his own party and ran it a for decade, (it) helped him earn the image of a strongman," Palshikar writes.

Why nephew Ajit broke with uncle Sharad

Nov 24, 2019: The Times of India

Key Highlights

The ED case against him can now be made to go away or at least put in cold storage with the BJP’s help

In the battle for the Pawar legacy/constituency, he felt this was the best way to get ahead of his uncle’s daughter, Supriya Sule

NEW DELHI: No one, except for Ajit Pawar himself and those in his innermost circle, can tell for sure why he revolted against his uncle Sharad and joined forces with the BJP at the last minute. In the absence of a definitive reason, political analysts have little option but to fall back on theories. Here are a few:

• The ED case against him can now be made to go away or at least put in cold storage with the BJP’s help

• In the battle for the Pawar legacy/constituency, he felt this was the best way to get ahead of his uncle’s daughter, Supriya Sule

• Sharad Pawar didn’t choose him for dy CM till the last moment (another NCP leader’s name is rumoured to have been proposed)

• Was upset that his son Parth lost in the LS elections because he didn’t have the full backing of the NCP machinery. Also the launch of Sharad Pawar’s grand-nephew Rohit was seen by him as an attempt to scuttle Parth

• He felt Sharad Pawar made an effort to rally the party around himself when ED, at the high court’s instance, included his name among the cooperative bank scam accused, but Ajit was left to fend for himself when he faced similar legal troubles

• He was more comfortable with BJP than Sena right from the beginning

• In the past, he was upset when Bhujbal was made deputy CM in 2008. Again, in 2010, when Ashok Chavan resigned as CM after Adarsh, Ajit thought the new CM should be from NCP as the party had more legislators than Congress by then. Congress’s Prithviraj Chavan became CM, and he was made deputy CM.

Divergent legal views on the Governor’s action

Dhananjay Mahapatra, Nov 24, 2019: The Times of India

The legal position on the formation of the government
From: Dhananjay Mahapatra, Nov 24, 2019: The Times of India

Maharashtra governor BS Koshyari’s twin pre-dawn decisions — requesting revocation of President’s rule followed by administering oath to Devendra Fadnavis as CM — has raised several constitutional questions that left top constitutional experts like Soli J Sorabjee and Harish Salve taking divergent views.

Former attorney general Sorabjee, who had successfully argued in the Supreme Court against Bihar governor Buta Singh’s decision to reject NDA’s claim to form government, dissolve the state assembly and recommend imposition of President’s Rule in 2005, told TOI that the governor’s action was a “disgrace to the constitutional process” required to be followed for formation of government. He said, “The Governor has acted hastily. He should have waited for the NCP-Shiv Sena-Congress post-poll alliance to stake claim rather than hastily administer oath to Devendra Fadnavis.”

Sorabjee said, “Even now nothing has been lost for the NCP-Sena-Congress post-poll alliance. They can defeat Fadnavis-led government during the trust vote on the floor of the House and then stake claim to form government.”

However, senior advocate Harish Salve told TOI from London that the so-called post-poll alliance between NCP-Sena-Congress could not present the governor with an alternative and the governor had no means to ignore the late night development of Ajit Pawar, leader of NCP’s legislature party in Maharashtra, giving support letter to BJP.

“Let us not forget that BJP is the largest party in the House with 105 MLAs. It would have been against constitutional mandate to deny BJP-led post-poll coalition to form government if the Ajit Pawar has given letter of support to BJP. So it is now for the BJP-led coalition to prove its majority on the floor of the House. For the governor, what counts is his satisfaction about which coalition prima facie commands majority support in the House,” he said, and asked, “If NCP supports BJP, what is so horribly wrong about the governor’s decision.”

The Sarkaria Commission on Centre-state relations dealt with this issue and emphasised that “the governor, while going through the process of selection as described, should select a leader who, in his (governor’s) judgement, is most likely to command a majority in the Assembly. The Governor’s subjective judgement will play an important role.”

The Supreme Court in Rameshwar Prasad judgement in 2006 had said, “If a political party with the support of other political party or other MLA’s stakes claim to form a government and satisfies the governor about its majority to form a stable government, the governor cannot refuse formation of government and override the majority claim because of his subjective assessment that the majority was cobbled by illegal and unethical means. No such power has been vested with the governor. Such a power would be against the democratic principles of majority rule.”

The CMP of the Aghadi alliance

Clara Lewis, Nov 29, 2019: The Times of India

For a party that once demanded the deletion of the words “secular” and “socialist” from the preamble to the Constitution, the Shiv Sena has come a long way.

The very first line of the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) forged by the Sena-led coalition in Maharashtra espouses the upholding of “secular values”.

The CMP signed by Uddhav Thackeray, Jayant Patil (NCP president) and Balasaheb Thorat (Congress state chief) says, “The alliance partners commit to uphold the secular values enshrined in the Constitution.” It states that on contentious issues of national importance, especially those with consequences for the “secular fabric of the nation”, the tripartite coalition will take a joint view after consultations.

The CMP, released hours before Thursday’s swearingin, lays out a road-map for governance, listing out proposed initiatives in several sectors, including industry, where it promises faster clearances, healthcare with wider insurance coverage, and bigger homes through slum rehab. It also promises immediate aid to farmers hit by unseasonal weather as well as a loan waiver.

It says a law will be enacted to reserve 80% of private sector jobs for locals and promises to fill up all vacant state government posts immediately.

Secret operation

Sudhir Suryawanshi, June 22, 2022: The Times of India

On November 23, 2019, after Devendra Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar were sworn in as the chief minister and deputy chief minister, respectively, many NCP legislators who were present at Raj Bhavan had rushed to meet Sharad Pawar at Silver Oak. However, there were some who did not. The BJP had seven private jets waiting at the airport to fly out the 38 NCP legislators who were expected to arrive straight from Raj Bhavan. Eventually, only one aircraft flew out four legislators from Mumbai to New Delhi. The legislators would be kept at the Oberoi, a five-star luxury hotel in Gurgaon, Haryana, where the BJP’s Manohar Lal Khattar was in power. These four legislators were Daulat Daroda, Zirwal Narhari Sitaram, Nitin Pawar and Anil Patil.


Sharad Pawar was restless to get back his legislators on time. It was an issue of prestige, credibility and ability. At the same time, Amit Shah was ready to wrestle the NCP to keep the legislators in his custody. Pawar shared the details of the four missing legislators with the NCP youth wing president, Dheeraj Sharma, who originally belonged to Haryana, to find out the whereabouts of these legislators and, if possible, chart out a rescue plan.

Sharma was in Pune for some work, and he forwarded the details of the four missing legislators to Sonia Doohan, the national president of the party’s student wing. Doohan, 28, is a political science student at Kurukshetra University in Haryana, and she was at that time in Gurgaon, all set to leave with her siblings for a wedding ceremony in Jaipur, Rajasthan. An urgent message from her party leader forced her to cancel the wedding plans. 
Doohan immediately dialled the numbers of a few contacts. She learnt that the NCP legislators were in a Gurgaon hotel. She was also told that they were being allegedly guarded by a police force and some BJP workers. She managed to find out the room numbers of the NCP legislators. Sharma told Doohan to prepare a ‘rescue’ plan with her team. Meanwhile, he would be flying to Delhi and would be in Gurgaon soon.


About 180 were chosen for this highly secret ‘rescue’ plan. A majority of the team members consisted of women from a local area to ensure secrecy. They would have to deal with not only the hotel but also the BJP government and its machinery. A huge risk was involved. But Doohan was a true Haryanvi in spirit. Having spent her childhood in the countryside, she was tough in her attitude and took this as a challenge to prove her leadership to her seniors and help them in difficult times. She had been fascinated by Sharad Pawar and his politics since her childhood. She admired his political acumen.

For someone unfamiliar with the layout of the hotel, it could seem like a labyrinth. It was especially difficult to get acquainted with the numerous entry and exit points. The legislators were held up in rooms on the fifth floor. There were restaurants on the ground floor. However, the entrances to the main hotel and to the restaurants were separate. Here, Doohan had an advantage. The hotel was located just 3km from her residence, and she was familiar with the hotel’s layout.


“I formed a team of women and told them that they were going for an important assignment. Once I entered the hotel, I shared the details about the operation,” said Doohan to this author. She further said, “When I entered the hotel, on the ground floor, more than 100 people were sitting in a group. They were wearing kurta and pyjama. It was drawing attention in the posh five-star hotel. That convinced me that whatever I had learnt from my sources was correct.”


Doohan also noticed that a senior BJP leader from Gurgaon, a senior police officer and a police inspector were also present. “I knew this police officer and even the inspector quite well because of my political activities. I called the officer immediately and asked him, ‘ Bhai kahaan hai [Where are you, brother]?’ He replied, ‘Sister, I am here only, tell me why you called, any work?’” She then asked him what exactly was happening at the hotel. He was taken aback by her question and said, “Do not ask me, I will not help you in this matter. But this work is related to you only.” 
Doohan called Sharma and confirmed the location of the NCP legislators. Sharma reported the same to Sharad Pawar, who told him, “I knew our people are there, but have you identified them and their exact locations?” Sharma immediately replied, “Yes, they are in our area only. If they are hostages, then we can easily rescue them. But if something untoward happens, then you will need to take care of it and we would need full party support for this operation.” Pawar told him to proceed but with certain precautions. The NCP legislators were staying on the fifth floor of the hotel. 


Doohan said, “We tried to book a room on the fifth floor, but we were told that all the rooms on that floor were already booked. Then we booked four rooms on different floors; the tariff for these was ₹20,000 a night.” Once Sonia and her team were inside the hotel, they hatched three plans to rescue their party legislators. “We took the manager of the hotel into confidence and requested him to help. He was afraid and said he could lose his job. I assured him that even if he lost his job, he would be given a job in Mumbai at any five-star hotel of his choice. It will be better than this.” The manager came on board.


The manager shared the layout of the hotel in which the points of entrance and exit were visible. He pointed out the exit at the back of the hotel that was primarily used by the owner of the hotel and the main staff. Importantly, this exit had no CCTV cameras installed. This exit was also connected to another adjoining hotel, the Trident. It was one property with two different hotels connected by an underground tunnel. The manager suggested that they take these legislators through the secret exit and lodge them in the adjoining hotel for a few minutes. Then they could be taken outside in vehicles that would be parked and ready for them at the Trident. 
The other plan was to bring these four legislators down to the swimming pool of the hotel and lead them out through an inside route. The last plan was to directly go into these legislators’ rooms and somehow manage to escort them out of the resort.


“If the BJP people and administration scuffled with them, then we would have to fight. The women of the team would then be at the forefront. No female constable was present. If they wanted to arrest the women, a female constable would have to be called in. That would take at least 10 to 15 minutes or more, which would be a wide enough gap for other teams to rush to the rooms and whisk them out. The designated team for the third plan was waiting in a car outside the hotel. The work had been divided, but we decided that the third plan would be used only as a last resort. No fight and ruckus in the beginning,” said Doohan. She added, “We were already present in the hotel and Dheeraj Sharma had also reached Delhi and joined us.” 


The legislators who were camped in the Oberoi had had their phones snatched away and had been given smaller handsets. They were allowed to speak with only their families. “We had their photographs, so we identified them easily. All of them were kept in different rooms on the fifth floor of the same hotel. It was very difficult to connect with them. Their phones had been taken away by the BJP people and the police, who were inside the hotel. Only after checking the authenticity of a call was it given to these legislators,” said Sonia.

A member of the NCP students’ wing asked the laundry in-charge to call one of the legislators, to say his clothes would take time to clean and iron and whether he was okay with it. The laundry guy of the hotel called Anil Patil, and someone else — probably a BJP worker — picked up the phone. Upon hearing that it was the laundry person, the call was given to Patil. The laundry guy, as per the instructions of the NCP student leaders, informed him about his ‘clothes’ after which Patil was told that ‘Ajit Dada’ had sent some people inside the hotel and that they were no longer going ahead with the BJP.


Earlier, these four legislators had not responded to the hints of Doohan’s team. So, another team decided to use ‘Ajit Dada’s’ name deliberately. The laundry guy murmured to Patil that the plan had changed and that it should not be disclosed to anyone in the hotel. He was also told to be prepared for a rescue operation. After hearing ‘Ajit Dada’s’ name, Patil was sure that something serious must have happened. They were ready to come out. He also informed the other three legislators about this plan. He spoke with them in Marathi, so the Hindi-speaking personnel guarding them could not understand the plan. However, the problem was that the entire fifth floor was full of security personnel and BJP workers. It was difficult to bypass them and enter the rooms of the legislators. 
At one point in time, the BJP workers were shuffling out — a fresh batch of people were coming in to probably relieve the people in the first shift from their duty on the fifth floor. Some of them were also going for dinner. This exchange provided a window of just a few minutes around 9pm, and Doohan and her team decided to use this time to swiftly execute the rescue operation.

The laundry man called all four legislators in their rooms via the intercom. They were told that all of them had been summoned to appear near the swimming pool within the next two minutes. Patil and Daroda said something to the BJP people and courageously rushed towards the swimming pool of the hotel. Doohan was monitoring the sensitive operation. She immediately took the elevators and rushed towards the swimming pool herself where both Patil and Daroda were waiting in the corner. Doohan did not know any of them personally, but she uttered her party’s name like a code of sorts. “NCP”, she said, and immediately both Patil and Daroda replied, “Yes, yes, NCP.” Sharma was on his way to the hotel’s exit at the back with his vehicle to pick up the legislators. 
Doohan also needed to get her vehicle before leaving the hotel. After confirming with the NCP legislators, she rushed to pick up her car. She handed over the keys of her car to the receptionist and asked the person to get the car out immediately. “I then saw the BJP Gurgaon president, Bhupinder Chauhan, along with his people, so I decided to go back to the elevator to hide. The BJP people would have recognised me, so I decided to keep myself away from them. The elevator was the only option,” she said. 
She asked the two legislators, Patil and Daroda, to remain silent. For a few minutes, they suspected that she was from the BJP. “I again assured them, ‘NCP, NCP, saheb’.” They ultimately realised they were in safe hands.

By that time the BJP workers who were guarding the legislators had come down from the fifth floor and had started shouting, “ Vidhayak chale gaye, vidhayak chale gaye [the legislators are gone]!” Sharma’s team had to engage in a scuffle with the BJP people on the fifth floor. Doohan went back to the poolside and told Patil and Daroda, “ Bhago, red colour ki car bahar raah dekh raaha hai [Run fast, a red-coloured car is waiting for you outside].”

Sharma was already waiting at the rear exit of the hotel. Another red-coloured jeep was waiting at the Trident for these legislators. “I again went back to the hotel lobby to take my car,” said Doohan. 
More than 50 BJP workers were gathered at the lobby and were shouting, “ Gaye, gaye, vidhayak gaye [The legislators have left]!”, “ Le gai, ladki leke gai, ek ladki leke gai [One girl has taken the camped legislators away]”, “‘ Unki student wali le gai [Their student leader has taken them away].” Chauhan shouted at his people, “ Mai apako bol raha tha, usko dharlo, tumse dhari na gai [I was telling you guys, catch hold of her, but you did not do anything]!” 
At the time when the BJP workers were creating a pandemonium in the lobby, Doohan had arrived to pick up her car. The BJP workers had no clue that this was the same woman who had taken away their legislators. The staff at the reception looked at her keys and told her that she would get her car on the ground floor. “I said to myself ‘ Mar gaye [I am dead]!’” said Doohan. All the BJP workers were on the ground floor searching for her. “I was tense and confused… but I decided to go down again…” she said.


As she took the elevator, someone recognised her and shouted, “ Arre gai, gai, gai, woh ladki toh yahi hai, pakdo, pakdo, gulabi colour ki kurta wali ko pakdo [She is gone! That girl is here only. Catch her, catch her… she is wearing a pink kurta]!” Doohan handed over the keys to the receptionist at the ground floor and demanded that her car be sent immediately. Four police vans standing outside the hotel were alerted on their wireless that a woman in a pink kurta had taken away the legislators from the hotel. As she rushed out of the hotel in her car, the police spotted her and started chasing her.

“Delhi was a relatively safe zone for us. But the 2km distance from the hotel to the border felt like 20km. It was a huge risk and a lot was at stake,” said Doohan. “We had planned that as soon as we reached the border, we would reshuffle the legislators to a different vehicle. I was driving my SUV. I summoned all my energy and decided to drive as fast as possible. I knew that if the Gurgaon police managed to get hold of us, that would be the end of this rescue operation,” she said. 


Doohan was aware that at night, that is, after sunset, no one, including the police, can stop the vehicle of a woman for checking. She decided to use this rule to her advantage as she whisked away the NCP legislators from Gurgaon to Delhi. Her car was being followed by what looked like police vehicles.


“It was like a chor-police chase that we played plenty of times in our childhood, except that this was being played in a very different way. The distance was short but the risk was high. I knew Gurgaon like the back of my hand, so I decided to go for a little-known internal route to confuse those following us. I took the narrow lanes through which hardly any vehicle could pass. In the middle of all this, we also changed the cars to confuse them further,” said Doohan.


“But the cars following us were not leaving us,” she continued. “They were constantly behind our vehicles. Often, there was hardly any distance between their cars and our vehicles. However, we had one main advantage: my vehicle was automatic while they had a manual one. This ensured that they were somehow always at a safe distance.” She confessed that she was driving very rashly. “In my entire life, I have never driven at such a high speed. But crossing the border was our main target.”


Doohan said that they finally managed to cross the Haryana-Delhi border by taking an uncharted route. “We looked back and were relieved to see the vehicles halt at the Haryana border. As a safety measure, we shifted the legislators to my vehicle in the Shiv Murti area in Delhi,” said Doohan.

However, even in Delhi, they went through a different route to reach 6 Janpath, the residence of Sharad Pawar. While all this was under way, the rescued NCP legislators were panicking and had started shouting, demanding to know where they were being taken through these unfamiliar, narrow roads. They asked Sharma where ‘Ajit Dada’ was and demanded to speak with him right away.


Sharma calmly dialled Sharad Pawar’s number and handed the phone to Patil and Daroda. After hearing Pawar’s voice at the other end, they were shocked. They immediately changed their tone and pleaded, “ Saheb, ami tumachya barobarach ahot, amala fasavala, chuk zali, maf kara, chuk padarat ghya [Saheb, we are sorry, we had no idea about this game plan. We made a mistake, please forgive us].” Pawar replied, “Why did you cheat me? You have been elected because of me and my party. What will you get by doing this?” Pawar seemed angry.

Patil and Daroda continued their attempts to convince their boss, “We were told by Ajit Dada that you were also part of this game plan of going with the BJP. We did not get the real information. After watching the news on TV, we realised our mistake. We should not have listened to Ajit Dada. He misguided us.” The NCP legislators also had a word with Supriya Sule. Meanwhile, they reached 6 Janpath.


The operation, which had begun in Gurgaon at 9pm, ended at 12.30am, when they reached Sharad Pawar’s bungalow. Senior leaders were waiting for them. Flight tickets from Delhi to Mumbai had already been booked. The flight was scheduled to leave Delhi at 2.17am and land at 4.40am in Mumbai. Pawar was constantly in touch with his young brigade.


Both Doohan and Sharma with their team had tea and coffee late at night. They had just begun to relax for a bit when someone asked where the other two legislators were. “We were shocked. How had this happened!” said Doohan. They were so tense throughout the operation that they had not checked who was with them and who wasn’t. They realised, much to their dismay, that two of the four legislators had not been rescued.

They once again called the NCP students and youth wing members who were at that time staying in the room that had been booked at the hotel. They were busy celebrating the success of this operation. More than 100 team members were there in the hotel, scattered inside and outside the premises. Doohan called them and informed them that the operation was not over.


“Two NCP legislators are still there in the hotel,” conveyed a worried Doohan to her team. They were asked to prepare for another mission to rescue these two NCP legislators: Zirwal Narhari and Nitin Pawar who were still lodged in the same hotel.

However, given the circumstances, everyone was on high alert now. To carry out a similar operation would be an uphill task for Doohan and Sharma. Everyone in the police now knew about the both of them. However, they did not want to give up. They set their minds to plan a second operation, but with a different strategy. 


First, a trusted aide of Sharma was sent back to the hotel to assess the situation and devise a plan. “It was clear that a peaceful operation would not work this time. We asked them to plan a hit-and-run operation. Around 2.30am, 100 youths of the NCP student wing barged into the fifth floor and knocked on the doors where the two NCP legislators were staying. But no one was in the rooms. They were shocked and wondered if the BJP had relocated these two legislators,” recounted Doohan.

They called Sharma, who told them firmly to continue with their operation until it yielded a positive result. The NCP youths then knocked on every room on the fifth floor. Some of them were locked. The hotel manager’s help was sought to open the doors.

One by one, every room on the fifth floor was checked. There was one room at the corner near the staircase which remained. They decided to check that. They knocked on the door and there was no response. They knocked a couple of times more and then discovered that the two NCP legislators were resting inside.


Doohan said, “BJP workers rushed to prevent them from taking the NCP legislators away. A fight broke out. The NCP youth were present in large numbers. The BJP had around 50 workers while the NCP numbered around 100, and that too well-built students. A group of NCP youths had caught hold of the two NCP legislators and got them to the ground floor while the other group kept the BJP workers engaged in a fight on the fifth floor itself.” 
Doohan mentioned that a large group of BJP workers were there on the ground floor and they were being helped by the police. They immediately rushed to rescue the two NCP legislators from the clutches of the NCP’s youth and students’ wing workers.


Zirwal, one of the NCP legislators, attempted to pacify the two groups by saying that he was not being forced and was going with them willingly. This further angered a couple of BJP workers who then assaulted Zirwal. Zirwal was badly injured. The NCP members asked Nitin Pawar to leave the hotel immediately for Sharad Pawar’s residence — 6 Janpath — and they said that they would follow him soon. Nitin Pawar left the hotel as instructed. He had also been instructed to take an autorickshaw and not a car. He left and caught an auto right outside the hotel.

Zirwal, at this time, was bleeding and in pain. An NCP student leader threatened to go live on Facebook and show the world that the BJP was beating him up. But even when he actually went live, the BJP workers said that the NCP could do whatever it wanted, but they would not leave Zirwal. Another group of NCP workers who had been waiting outside the hotel until then heard about the scuffle and immediately rushed inside. 


The BJP workers now realised that the NCP had more muscle power. Moreover, the live video-streaming put them on the back foot. They finally conceded defeat. Zirwal was promptly carried to a vehicle, which immediately left for 6 Janpath.


On their way, they also found the auto in which Nitin Pawar was travelling. The auto was easily identifiable due to its ‘HR’ number plate, and an auto from Haryana in Delhi was a rare sight. Nitin Pawar was also shifted to the car and brought to Sharad Pawar’s residence. The mission was finally accomplished by 4.30am. 
On reaching 6 Janpath, the legislators realised that they had left their MLA certificates in their bags at the hotel. The letters were very significant and would be needed later. A team was alerted and sent back to the hotel. The manager of the hotel was informed and once again his help was sought. When they reached the hotel, no one from the BJP was there. Most of them had left. The bags were collected and brought back to 6 Janpath. The entire rescue operation, which had begun the previous day, ended at 8am on November 25.

The four rescued legislators landed in Mumbai and reached the Grand Hyatt where Sharad Pawar was waiting for them. During the journey from Delhi to Mumbai, these MLAs pleaded with Sharma and Doohan, requesting them to tell Sharad Pawar that they had been misguided by Ajit Pawar and forcefully taken to Haryana. The NCP youth team reassured them, “Do not worry, now you are with us. If a person goes missing in the morning and comes home by the end of the day, then he is not a ‘missing person’.”


After landing in Mumbai, Pawar warmly greeted Doohan, Sharma and their team and appreciated their marvellous work at such a crucial time. Doohan said, “The party members looked happy. It was a wonderful moment that I cannot express in words. To bring back legislators from a state under a BJP government was a tough task.” Subsequently, the signatures of these four MLAs were taken and sent to the Supreme Court with the statement that the NCP had the support of 53 legislators.


Doohan mentioned that after having worked hard for the past couple of days, it was a reward in itself to see Pawar’s smiling face. She was later extensively interviewed by the media and appeared on several television channels. Sharma had wanted her to handle the media.


The same day, in the evening, during the ‘We Are 162’ gathering, Sharad Pawar called her in front of Uddhav Thackeray, Sanjay Raut and other important leaders and asked them, ‘Do you know her?’ They were curious. Pawar told them, “Sonia is the ‘heroine’ of this story. She has done a wonderful job. Sonia made this government happen.”


An extract from Checkmate: How the BJP Won and Lost Maharashtra (Penguin Random House India).

Irrigation projects: Ajit Pawar gets 'clean chit’

Vaibhav Ganjapure & Prafulla Marpakwar , Dec 6, 2019 Times of India

MUMBAI: Nine days after he resigned as deputy chief minister, NCP leader Ajit Pawar has been given a 'clean chit' by the state anti-corruption bureau (ACB) in cases linked to alleged irregularities in irrigation projects in Nagpur division.

In an affidavit filed before the Nagpur bench of the Bombay high court on Wednesday, ACB superintendent Rashmi Nandedkar informed that "no criminal liability was found on VIDC chairman's (as minister, Pawar held charge) part in the process of granting sanction to the liability of tender cost in 100 tenders out of 302. It included that of updated cost and sanctioning of mobilization advance to the contractors or any other allegations/charges".

"The inquiry into remaining tenders is under way," Nandedkar told TOI.

Though the affidavit was filed in HC on Wednesday, it was prepared and signed on November 27, the day after both Devendra Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar resigned. Fadnavis reacted sharply to the news of the affidavit filed by the ACB to suggest that the probe findings were altered to give Pawar a clean chit. "I do not agree with the contents of the affidavit filed in the investigation in 100 out of 302 tenders , I think court will not accept it, since it is completely contradictory to the affidavit filed by the then head of the ACB in November last year,"' Fadnavis told TOI.

It was on December 28, 2014 that Fadnavis, who was then the CM, granted permission to ACB to conduct an open inquiry against Pawar and Sunil Tatkare (water resources minister) for their alleged role in irregularities and corruption in allotment of contracts for irrigation projects. However, in the last five years, the ACB has been unable to establish if Pawar is involved in the scam.

Deputy SP Milind Totre, who was the investigating officer, told TOI that the latest affidavit was filed after seeking clarification from the government on various allegations made against Pawar, as per the HC's directives. "The former minister is not made an accused in any of the FIRs lodged in Nagpur and Amravati. Therefore, we had sought clarification from the government on charges against him," he said.

Nandedkar said nothing adverse regarding "money trail linkages" has been noticed so far. Neither the documentary nor oral evidence could be gathered during the course of inquiry/investigation.

"There are some procedural lapses and departmental irregularities such as sending some files and proposals by the executive director to chairman directly without routing those through the WRD's managing director/principal secretary. Other irregularities includes the payment of EMD amount by the successful bidders for their competitors in some cases and issuing of tender booklets to some non-eligible bidders/joint venture firms without following pre conditions of the tenders," the ACB SP said.

The state cabinet

Prafulla Marpakwar and Ambarish Mishra, Dec 31, 2019: The Times of India

Debutant MLA Aaditya Thackeray (29) was inducted as cabinet minister in the Maha Vikas Aghadi government led by his father Uddhav Thackeray, making the Thackerays the first father-son duo to be part of the cabinet together in Maharashtra.

NCP’s Ajit Pawar, who had rebelled against his uncle Sharad Pawar and joined hands with BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis to become his deputy during the second, short-lived Fadnavis-led government that collapsed in 80 hours, returned as deputy chief minister.

Thirty-six ministers in the three-party government of the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress took oath at Vidhan Bhavan on Monday, more than a month after Uddhav became CM on November 28.

Sonrise surprises not only Sena, but allies too

Aditya’s induction into the ministry headed by his father and chief minister Uddhav Thackeray took not only Shiv Sainiks but also NCP and Congress by surprise. No other CM in the state had earlier inducted his son or daughter, though such precedents exist in other states.

Though other dynasts such as Ashok Chavan (son of late CM Shankarrao Chavan), Amit Deshmukh (son of late CM Vilasrao Deshmukh), Sunil Kedar (son of senior neta Babasaheb Kedar), Varsha Gaikwad (daughter of ex-Congress MP Eknath Gaikwad) and Aditi Tatkare (daughter of NCP’s Sunil Tatkare) were among those sworn in, Mantralaya mandarins said that with Uddhav as chief minister , Aaditya’s induction appeared out of sync with the time-honoured rule in state politics that the “beta-beti” brigade could take measured steps on the highway to power.

Stating that Aaditya’s swearing-in took his party by surprise, a Congress veteran said, “There is no question of Sena taking NCP-Congress into confidence before choosing its ministers.” Pointing out that Congress had evolved a mechanism for transfer of power to the young generation, he said, “The first step is to give them party matters. Even Pandit Nehru refrained from inducting Indiraji into his cabinet.”

A bureaucrat said in 2000, NCP chief Pawar did not induct his daughter Supriya Sule into the Congress-NCP ministry but “asked her to go through the paces before she could claim her place in the sun”.

Ahough no allocation of portfolios took place on Monday, NCP sources said the party has secured the crucial home department.

Sanjay Raut absent as bro misses out

Sanjay Raut, who was instrumental in paving the way for the Maha Vikas Aghadi government, stayed away from the swearing-in ceremony, causing tongues to wag in Sena circles that he was unhappy over his brother Sunil’s non-inclusion in the cabinet. Sunil later said he was a “true and loyal Sainik”.

Four Muslims get berths

Syed Rizwanullah, Dec 31, 2019 The Times of India

Four Muslim faces in the Uddhav Thackeray ministry have come as a major boost for Congress and NCP considering the challenge from AIMIM in the state.

The Hyderabad-based party had dented Congress-NCP’s prospects over the past few elections, including Lok Sabha and assembly, by eating into Muslim votes. Shiv Sena too has extended an olive branch to the Muslim community by appointing Abdul Sattar, a firebrand MLA from Sillod in Aurangabad district, as a junior minister. The other Muslims inducted into the cabinet are Nawab Malik, Aslam Shaikh and Hasan Mushrif.

Malik, a Pawar acolyte and NCP’s key minority leader, was re- elected to the state assembly from Mumbai. Mushrif is also a force to reckon within NCP. Kagal, near Kolhapur, is his bastion. Aslam Shaikh is a Congress MLA from Malad West.

A senior MIM functionary said, “This will impact MIM and help strengthen the Congress-NCP base among the minorities.”

Political dynasts in the cabinet

Ambarish Mishra, January 1, 2020: The Times of India

MUMBAI: A sizeable chunk of portfolios in the Maha Vikas Aghadi government has been snapped up by dynasts as 18 of the total 36 ministers sworn in by governor B S Koshyari belong to political families with long links with power.

Aaditya Thackeray leads the pack in a team led by his father, CM Uddhav Thackeray. Aaditya’s induction was planned by his close relatives late Sunday evening. Barring a party veteran known to be a Matoshree loyalist, none of the Sena seniors were consulted on the issue, sources said. “It appears Uddhavji took a cue from the Gandhi family. He didn’t want Aaditya to be seen like Rahul Gandhi, hemming and hawing on whether or not to accept the party leadership. The family thought Aaditya should be groomed in public administration and governance without loss of time,” said a Sena politician.

Other young dynasts who have entered Mantralaya as mantris include Aditi Tatkare, daughter of NCP heavyweight Sunil Tatkare of Raigad, while Amit Deshmukh’s father, the late Vilasrao Deshmukh, was CM in early 2000. Senior ministers with formidable political antecedents include Sunil Kedar, Yashomati Thakur, Satej Patil (aka Bunty, a family monicker, which the minister retains), Rajesh Tope, Vishwajit Kadam and Warsha Gaikwad.

Vivek Surve, a 29-year-old professional from Mumbai, said there was “nothing wrong” in these netas getting posts “except that all doors were wide open for them and opportunities offered on a silver platter because they were someone’s kin.” Interestingly, the popular ire is directed not so much against senior representatives of political ‘khandaans’ as against what is seen as the “post-2000 beta-beti brigade which doesn’t see a need to prove their credentials.” “No baptism by fire for them,” said noted theatre person Vishwas Sohoni. “If a doctor or lawyer grooms his child to follow his profession, so can a politician. Those like Ashok Chavan (whose father Shankarrao Chavan was ex-CM) and Jayant Patil (son of Rajarambapu Patil, a veteran politician) have been around for years. They have gone through the highs and lows of politics. Present-day ‘babalog’ refuse to go through the paces,” Sohoni said.

There have been exceptions, said analysts. Raj Thackeray, who stepped out of the shadow of his uncle in 2005 and Dhananjay Munde, Gopinath Munde’s nephew, who joined NCP and is now cabinet minister. NCP leader Ajit Pawar too is keen on reinforcing his credentials, said party watchers, after his coup last month. That Ajit still wields clout in the NCP became evident when party chief Sharad Pawar chose him, even after his failed revolt, for the deputy CM’s office, setting aside claims of loyalists such as Jayant Patil and Dilip Walse-Patil.

2021

Maharashtra legislative council elections, Dec

Dec 15, 2021: The Hindu

In a major jolt to the tripartite Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) Government in Maharashtra, the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has won both Legislative Council seats, elections for which were held on December 10. One of the seats was earlier held by the Shiv Sena. With this victory, the BJP has won four of the six Council seats while the rest of the seats were already declared unopposed.

Term expiring

“This victory has busted the myth that the MVA can win any election if all three parties contest unitedly,” said former Chief Minister and Leader of the Opposition Devendra Fadnavis. Of the six, one seat each went to the Sena and the Congress.

The term of eight sitting MLCs is set to expire in January. However, with regard to the local authorities’ constituencies election, the ECI’s guidelines say if at least 75% of them in the constituency are functioning and in addition at least 75% of the voters are available, then the electorate is treated as available for electing the MLC. Only five of the local authorities fulfil the criteria leading to election to only six seats instead of eight.

State’s former Energy Minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule defeated Congress candidate Mangesh Deshmukh in Nagpur seat by securing 362 votes against the latter’s 186. Mr. Deshmukh, who had earlier filed the nomination as an Independent, was supported by the Congress after its candidate Ravindra Bhoyar expressed inability to contest.

The big blow to the Sena came in the form of the defeat of three-term MLC Gopikishan Bajoriya from Akola-Washim-Buldhana seat by BJP’s Vasant Khandelwal who won 443 votes against Sena candidate’s 334 votes.

‘Horse trading’

After his victory, Mr. Bawankule slammed Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole saying the latter’s party got into horse-trading of voters in the last two days. “These Congress leaders are behaving in an autocratic manner. He [Mr. Patole] does not have the right to remain in his post,” he said. Two seats in the Brihanmumbai Muncipal Corproation (BMC) had gone unopposed with Sunil Shinde of the Sena and Rajhans Singh of the BJP wining them respectively. The Kolhapur and Nandurbar-Dhule seats were won by Satej alias Bunty Patil of the Congress and Ambrish Patel of the BJP unopposed.

2023

July: Ajit Pawar splits NCP joins government as Deputy CM

Prafulla Marpakwar, July 3, 2023: The Times of India

Ajit Pawar splits NCP joins government as Deputy CM, some details; Strength of NCP
From: Prafulla Marpakwar, July 3, 2023: The Times of India

Mumbai : Dealing a massive blow to his political mentor and uncle Sharad Pawar, NCP’s Ajit Pawar Sunday joined the Shinde-Fadnavis government as deputy CM, inaugurating yet another chapter of the dizzying drama that has engulfed Maharashtra’s politics for the past four years eversince MVA was formed and especially since Eknath Shinde sensationally caused the collapse of the MVA regime by breaking away from the Uddhav Thackeray camp a year ago.


Ajit (63) took oath at Raj Bhavan along with eight other NCP legislators. Among them were the party’s heavyweightsand party founder and president Sharad Pawar’s long-time aides like Dilip Walse Patil, Chhagan Bhujbal, Dhananjay Munde and Hasan Mushrif.


By Ajit’s side in this second rebellion of his — after his first one in November 2019 that fizzled out in just a couple of days — was Praful Patel, one of Pawar Senior’s oldest and closest associates who was recently anointed as NCP working president along with Pawar’s daughter Supriya Sule. 
Ajit submitted a list of 40 supporting NCP MLAs to governor Ramesh Bais. NCP has 54 MLAs in all in the assembly. Ajit is soon likely to move the EC to get the party’s name and symbol, sources said.

2024

Lok Sabha elections

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June 5, 2024: The Times of India

The seats won by and the vote share of the various parties in the Lok Sabha elections of 2019 and 2024 in Maharashtra
From: June 5, 2024: The Times of India

Maha Jolt To NDA, Big Boost For INDIA Bloc

Mumbai: In the 2019 polls, Maharashtra, which sends the second highest number of MPs to the Lok Sabha in the country, played a key role in PM Modi’s victory with the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance winning 41 of the state’s 48 seats. But in Verdict 2024, the state has delivered a major blow to the NDA. The opposition-led Maha Vikas Aghadi dominated the state with leads or victories in 30 seats, leaving the BJP-led Mahayuti alliance trailing far behind with leads or wins in just 17 seats. Vishal Patil, the Congress rebel who won from Sangli as an independent, is also expected to add to MVA’s numbers.


This is the outcome despite the BJP-triggered split of two regional parties—Shiv Sena and NCP—with the aim of fracturing the opposition and raising its own numbers. Instead, this consolidated the opposition vote, with Congress being the biggest beneficiary. Congress replaced BJP as the single largest party in the state with leads or victories in 13 seats. This was a dramatic turnaround from its historic low of winning just one seat in 2019.


Responding to the results, Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray said the INDIA bloc should stake claim to form the govt at the Centre. “We will be meeting tomorrow (Wednesday) to discuss this. It’s not as if BJP has not harassed Nitish Kumar and Chandrababu Naidu who are currently with NDA.”


Within Mahayuti, BJP’s tally plunged from 23 seats in 2019 to leads or wins in just 9 seats. Shinde’s Sena led or won in 7 seats and Ajit Pawar’s NCP had to settle for a single seat. Union ministers including Raosaheb Danve (Jalna) and Bharti Pawar (Dindori) were routed and state minister Sudhir Mungantiwar lost from Chandrapur.


Within the MVA, Thackeray’s Shiv Sena (UBT) bagged or led in 9 seats and NCP (SP) led in or won 8 seats. Both parties won more seats than the parties that split from them. In Baramati, the most keenly watched contest in the state, Sharad Pawar’s daughter Supriya Sule defeated Ajit Pawar’s wife, Sunetra Pawar.


Observers said it’s clear that Mahayuti’s strategy of relying on PM Modi’s appeal did not deliver results. On the contrary, ‘Operation Lotus’ boomeranged and generated sympathy for Thackeray and Sharad Pawar. Indeed, allying with Ajit Pawar who BJP had strongly targeted during the irrigation scam may have upset the party’s core voters.


Also, Modi’s statements about appeasement of Muslims during his Lok Sabha poll campaign, his reference to Sharad Pawar as “bhatakti aatma (wandering soul)” and Shiv Sena (UBT) as “nakli Sena” seem to have backfired.


Price rise, unemployment, agrarian distress and the opposition’s message that the Constitution would be changed to scrap the SC quota if Modi came back to office were among the macro factors that impacted the results. The Maratha agitation similarly cost the Mahayuti, especially in its epicentre, Marathwada.


Experts said the consolidation of Muslim and Dalit votes helped the MVA. “The youth face unemployment, farmers are upset with Centre’s policies and these sections went against Mahayuti. Muslims and Dalits consoli- dated in favour of the MVA,” said an NCP functionary.


The Lok Sabha results will have implications for the state assembly polls which are six months away.


How did the two Senas perform? The Shiv Sena UBT led in 9 seats, just two more than Shinde’s Shiv Sena. However, it had also contested 21 seats compared to Shinde’s 15. Thackeray’s strike rate for victory was 43% compared to Shinde’s 47%. But Thackeray dominated in Mumbai, winning two seats compared to one claimed by Shinde in the three contests between the parties in the city. However, in the Thane region, Shinde’s party wrested both the seats it contested against Sena (UBT).


In the Konkan belt which has been a stronghold of the Thackeray family, Sena (UBT) lost both seats. Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg was claimed by Uddhav Thackeray’s bete-noire, former CM Narayan Rane. This is the first time BJP has won a seat in the Konkan region.


Within the NCP factions, Sharad Pawar’s party dominated with leads in 8 seats and a victory in its citadel, Baramati. Ajit Pawar had to console himself with a single victory in Raigad for sitting MP Sunil Tatkare. Pawar Sr had contested 10 seats and had a strike rate of 80%. Ajit Pawar’s party contested 4 seats and had a strike rate of 25%.


Congress contested 17 seats and led in 13, leading to a strike rate of 76%. “MVA allies worked together and supported each other, down to booth level. This is what worked for us,” said Congress’s Prithviraj Chavan.
Meanwhile, BJP which won 9 of 28 seats contested, had a strike rate of 32%. It suffered a major setback in the Vidarbha region from where deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis hails, as its tally fell from 5 seats in 2019 to just 2.


The party did not win a single seat in Marathwada, the heart of the Maratha quota agitation, which has also been impacted by a fierce drought. 
BJP’s numbers also declined in its bastion North Maharashtra where the Centre’s export quota ban on onions, the main crop in the region, became a poll issue. Its seats here fell from 3 to 1. BJP’s tally also fell from 4 to 1 in Western Maharashtra and 3 to 1 in Mumbai.


Responding to the verdict, Thackeray said, “This is a victory of democracy. The PM should have held more rallies. The BJP lost in locations where he campaigned.”


Fadnavis tweeted, “The unfortunate outcome of the results is that the opposition attempted to win the seats through its propaganda that we would change the Constitution. But in elections, the people’s mandate has to be accepted as it is.”

In family bastion Baramati, Pawar’s daughter trumps his nephew’s wife

A Pawar defeated a Pawar to retain Baramati Lok Sabha seat, reaffirming Sharad Pawar’s enduring influence over the family stronghold, and damaging the morale of Ajit Pawar’s NCP. Senior Pawar’s deep personal connection with the electorate and the ability of her daughter, NCP (SCP)’s Supriya Sule, to leverage his legacy proved decisive in securing her victory against her sister-in-law and Ajit’s wife, Sunetra Pawar, by over 1.5 lakh votes. Supriya, three-time MP from Baramati, had to fight off a strong challenge mounted by the might of a combined BJP, Shiv Sena and NCP as she took on Sunetra. In her campaign speeches, she ensured to hammer home the point that she was battling “forces from Delhi”, and the electoral battle was not just another fight in the family. Her grassroots campaign, the emotional resonance of her appeals to Maharashtrian pride against “Delhi’s forces”, and her strategic use of a new party symbol, the Tutari, in her slogan “Ram Krishna Hari, Vajava Tutari” helped her romp home to victory. Much before the poll, Sharad started paving the way for Sule’s victory. He met many old rivals in the run-up to polls, soliciting their support.

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Priyanka.Kakodkar, June 5, 2024: The Times of India

Mumbai: Maharashtra’s ambitious and street-smart CM Eknath Shinde had shown time and again that he could not be written off. After being suppressed and passed over by Uddhav Thackeray, Shinde struck back by splitting Shiv Sena and taking it over. On allying with BJP to form the govt, he managed to wrest the top post, leaving a stunned Devendra Fadnavis to settle as his deputy. His direct proximity to the BJP brass in Delhi led to a sweet deal for the LS polls: 15 seats compared with four for BJP’s other ally, NCP.


The verdict will bring vindication and relief. Having won 7 seats, Shinde’s party has a better strike rate than BJP in Maharashtra (which won 10 of the 28 seats it contested). The verdict may well mean he continues to hold his bargaining position and can lead the Mahayuti alliance ahead of state assembly polls due in Oct.

While the result has not shown that he is a claimant to the reins of the “real Shiv Sena”, it may not exactly cause an exodus from Shinde’s party towards the resurgent Shiv Sena (UBT) ahead of assembly polls. In the 13 direct contests with Sena (UBT), Shinde’s party fared better in at least five— Buldhana, Hatkanangale, Kalyan, Maval, and Mumbai North West. Thackeray’s bruising campaign, pitching “loyalists” against “traitors”, did not entirely work.


In Kalyan, his son Shrikant Shinde won by over 2 lakh votes, while in Thane his nominee Naresh Mhaske was leading by over 2 lakh votes. 
“Shrikant Shinde won with a record margin. People have voted for the development work done by PM Modi in 10 years and our Maha yuti govt. Many seats were lost by a very thin margin and may be because the candidates were declared late. We will rethink these issues and rectify our mistakes,” Shinde said. 
For Shinde, having outperformed Ajit Pawar’s NCP, he has now shown his party is BJP’s more valuable ally.