Fadnavis: pre-poll split with Shiv Sena brought out BJP’s true potential

May 23, 2015 04:55 pm | Updated 05:08 pm IST - Pune

Kolhapur: BJP President Amit Shah (C) is garlanded by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis (L) and State President Raosaheb Danve during the party's State executive meeting in Kolhapur on Saturday. PTI Photo  (PTI5_23_2015_000057B)

Kolhapur: BJP President Amit Shah (C) is garlanded by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis (L) and State President Raosaheb Danve during the party's State executive meeting in Kolhapur on Saturday. PTI Photo (PTI5_23_2015_000057B)

With the first-ever executive meet of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Maharashtra unit being held amid a frisson of tension in Kolhapur, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Saturday commented that the crumbling of the BJP’s alliance with the Sena proved a blessing in disguise for his party.

In his address before the start of the two-day executive meet, Mr. Fadnavis said while the BJP had no inkling that their 25-year-old alliance with the Shiv Sena was about to collapse, he remarked the party would never have realised its true potential in Maharashtra had it not gone alone in the 2014 Assembly election.

“We fought alone and secured more than 120 seats in Maharashtra, stamping our presence in the State. Our membership in the country has surged from one crore to 10 crore and now we are the largest political party in the world,” said Mr. Fadnavis, lavishing gratitude on BJP President Amit Shah who inaugurated the meet.

At a time when the Sena-BJP squabbling has plumbed new depths, Mr. Fadnavis’ justification of the poll-eve split is expected to aggravate the mistrust that has plagued the functioning of the saffron coalition since December last year.

The alliance broke-up amid much acrimony late last year with the Uddhav Thackeray-led Sena accusing the BJP of pre-scripting the split, claiming it was covertly in cahoots with Sharad Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). The NCP offered unsolicited and unconditional support to the BJP soon after the results in which no party secured a full majority, forcing the Sena to join Mr. Fadnavis government and seal an uneasy truce with their estranged partner.

In his speech, Mr. Fadnavis said the BJP’s decision to contest the Maharashtra polls alone had the backing and full support of their senior leaders.

“We could not know we would have to go in [for the polls] without our ally [Shiv Sena]. Only days before the elections, we called up [BJP President] Amit Shah and told him we will have to fight the election alone. He [Amit Shah] told us whatever decision we took, he would stand by us,” Mr. Fadvanis said, heaping fulsome praise on Mr. Shah and recounting his achievements that helped the BJP come to power in the State.

Earlier, the opposition NCP sought to further widen the chasm in the fraught alliance by stating that the inefficiency of the Sena ministers in the cabinet was due to its internecine squabbling with the BJP.

The executive meet, in the presence of Mr. Shah and Union Minister Nitin Gadkari is expected to iron organisational and party problems in Maharashtra and formalise senior BJP leader Raosaheb Danve’s anointment as the BJP’s Maharashtra State President with the blessings of the executive committee.

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