Nagpur: The factionalism in the Nagpur city unit of the Congress has come to the fore once again as 17 of the 29 corporators in Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) refusing to accept Sanjay Mahakalkar as their leader.
After the NMC elections in which the Congress’s tally was reduced to 29 seats from 41 in 2012, the party decided to appoint Mr. Mahakalkar as the leader of the opposition (LoP). However, his appointment did not go down well with the majority of workers and corporators as they wanted to see Prafulla Gudadhe Patil as the LoP.
Mr. Mahakalkar is considered close to district Congress chief Vikas Thakre, who had suffered a humiliating defeat in the NMC elections.
Earlier this week, a group handed over a letter of support of 17 corporators to the Nagpur divisional commissioner and asked him to appoint Tananji Wanve as the LoP.
The development came two days before when Mr. Mahakalkar was planning to send Mr. Thakre as the nominated member to the NMC.
On Wednesday, the 17 corporators paraded in front of the divisional commissioner’s representative claiming a majority in the Congress unit.
“Mr. Mahakalkar was appointed unfairly by those who did not even have the people’s support and had lost their elections whereas popular leader like Mr. Patil was sidelined despite defeating the BJP panel in the Chief Minister’s backyard. We raised this issue with the state Congress leadership and also with vice-president Rahul Gandhi during a recent meeting in New Delhi. We are not opposed to anyone, but every decision in the party should be taken after consulting everyone, which was not done at the time of the appointment of Mr. Mahakalkar as the LoP,” Mr. Wanve told The Hindu .
“The State leadership had assured us that they would declare the group with the majority as the Congress unit. Now the majority is with us and we expect that the divisional commissioner give us a letter of recognition in a couple of days. We are keeping the State and the Central leadership in the loop about every single development,” he said.
Mr. Thakre, however, claimed that the breakaway group is illegal. “They do not have the party’s support. The party had sent an observer who had appointed Mr. Mahakalkar as the LoP. This group is backed by Satish Chaturvedi (former cabinet minister). I have already told the State leadership about this group’s anti-party activities.”
