Senior Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader (Ajit Pawar faction) Chhagan Bhujbal said that while the BJP and the Mahayuthi (National Democratic Alliance or NDA) will not find Maharashtra a cakewalk as it had in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Prime Minister Narendra Modi would still have an advantage in forming the government at the Centre.
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Speaking exclusively to The Hindu, Mr. Bhujbal said while it was true that this time around, with the split in the NCP and the Shiv Sena, and with six parties ranged against each other in two alliances, it was difficult to gauge what the people may be thinking, a national election would still gave Mr. Modi the advantage.
“While people are attending political meetings of this leader and that, they do come around to the view that this is an election to elect the Prime Minister of the country, who should be strong and who should be able to navigate what is going on internationally, be it Russia-Ukraine or West Asia. That gives Prime Minister Modi an undeniable advantage as the INDIA (Indian National Democratic, Inclusive Alliance) group is not united across the country,” Mr. Bhujbal said.
“In Maharashtra, it is not as though the BJP has a cakewalk like it was in 2014 and 2019, but it is also not the case that the Opposition parties will be able to dominate. The BJP and the Mahayuthi (NDA) will have to work hard, and we may even go down a few seats from the last time, we will get the largest share,” he said.
Mr. Bhujbal met The Hindu in Nashik, where he was first tipped to contest but later withdrew from the fray, sowing doubts about dissension in the ranks of the ruling Mahayuthi. He said that he had been sounded out to contest by senior leaders of the alliance, including Ajit Pawar, Praful Patel, Devendra Fadnavis and even Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, around a month ago, on the festival of Holi, and at that time, he had been advocating for his nephew, former MP Sameer Bhujbal. Soon after, he started preparations to contest. “But list after list has come out without my name, with news that the Shiv Sena (Shinde) was negotiating to hold on to the seat, and I felt humiliated, which is why I publicly withdrew from the contest,” he said.
Being considered for the seat but followed later by procrastination, he feels, owes also to the feeling that there is a “Maratha versus all” type of contest developing in the State, with confusion among political parties over how to deal with the situation in the light of the Maratha quota agitation led by Manoj Jarange-Patil.
“Whatever happened during the Maratha agitation, their striving for cutting into the OBC (Other Backward Classes) reservations, the violence that happened during the agitation, has created this situation. Some non-Maratha sections of the population feel why is it that only Marathas will get leadership roles, own sugar factories, dominate cooperative banks and milk cooperatives, and others are kept out,” Mr. Bhujbal said.
Successive governments, he said, had striven to address the issue, but Mr. Jarange-Patil’s agitation “was a bit much” due to his insistence that the Maratha quota should be carved out of the existing OBC quota, a demand rejected by four commissions and later Supreme Court, he added.
“The violence in Beed made the political class agitated. They rushed to quell the violence and speak to him [Mr. Jarange-Patil], resulting in him becoming larger than life in the Maratha community. This has led to a backlash among the OBCs, who felt that the silence of people like Sharad Pawar and Uddhav Thackeray on the violence was telling. I could not bear the fact that I, as an OBC leader, was being taunted to quit by Opposition leaders, but more so when I heard an MLA in the Shiv Sena (Shinde) say that I should be kicked out of the government. This was too much, and therefore I attended a big meeting of OBC groups and offered to quit to fight the fight of the community. Amidst all this, elections were declared, and I was sounded out for the ticket, but successive lists came out and this seat wasn’t declared, and despite all communities pledging support to me here, I felt that I should withdraw from the fray,” he said.
The OBC community, Mr. Bhujbal said, feels oppressed. “Despite being 54% of the population, we are divided into 374 castes. The Maratha reservation agitation has struck fear in them [the OBCs]. There is a bit of consolidation after I raised their voice, but they still fear. The more Jarange-Patil says keep OBC leaders at home and don’t allow them to contest, the more that fear will grow,” Mr. Bhujbal said.
