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National

Divisions still run deep in Maharashtra BJP

Meena Menon

Nitin Gadkari replaced Munde as State president in 2004
Gadkari group feels Munde wants favours for Mahajan family

MUMBAI: The crisis in the Maharashtra Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems to have blown over with Gopinath Munde taking back his resignation from party posts and expressing happiness with the outcome of his talks in New Delhi. However, divisions between Mr. Munde and president Nitin Gadkari will not be so easily ironed out, according to political observers.

Under these circumstances, it remains to be seen how the party will regroup with the challenge of the elections ahead. The party can ill afford to lose Mr. Munde, who has a wide mass base in the State and has mobilised Bahujan votes for the BJP. Mr. Munde has consistently worked with the other backward classes (OBC) and given the BJP cadre credibility among them.

That is one of the reasons the party has agreed to some of his demands and tolerated his dissent.

Since the death in April 2006 of the late BJP national general secretary Pramod Mahajan, Munde’s brother-in-law, the party has been in the doldrums in the State. Mr. Munde’s unhappiness goes back to the time he was removed as the State president in 2004 and replaced by Mr. Gadkari.

The appointment of Madhu Chavan as the city president was the last straw as Mr. Munde was keen on having one of his supporters in the key post. Mr. Munde had favoured three others for the post — the former MP Kirit Somaiya, the outgoing city chief Prakash Mehta and Raj Purohit, both MLAs. A three-member committee was set up to decide on a suitable person and Mr. Chavan emerged the consensus candidate.

However, Mr. Munde while admitting that he was all for a consensus, said there were other names which were not considered and the party did not always go by the consensus rule. The new Mumbai party unit president Gopal Shetty was decided upon by Mr. Gadkari, who has promised a highly disappointed Mr. Chavan a suitable post in the State unit.

Clearly the battle lines are drawn in the State between Mr. Munde and Mr. Gadkari and their followers. Mr. Munde’s resignation only made the party central leadership sit up and take note of this. Mr. Gadkari’s supporters say that Mr. Munde did not get any of his demands fulfilled by the central leadership.

While now there is talk of involving Mr. Munde and other leaders in the State coordination committee, party sources said decisions might not always go Mr. Munde’s way.

Mr. Gadkari placated Munde on Tuesday saying that he would be consulted in the decision making in future.

But there were serious disagreements in the past and Mr. Chavan’s choice was the latest. The Gadkari faction believes that Mr. Munde wants favours for the Mahajan family. He was disappointed that Pramod Mahajan’s wife Rekha was not the party’s choice for Rajya Sabha. Now Mr. Munde is promoting Mahajan’s daughter, Poonam.

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