BJP’s Turn to Pay Debt to Deva in Maharashtra
Maharashtra deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis with BJP leader Chandrakant Patil. Image credit @Devendra_Office
D-Day for BJP to Decide on Name of Maharashtra’s Next CM
By Manish Anand
New Delhi, November 26: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won Maharashtra Assembly elections on the strength of the leadership of incumbent deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis. His leadership in Maharashtra gave a robust fire power to the BJP’s bouquet of poll planks.
The BJP lost Jharkhand for lack of a strong leader in Ranchi. Strong local leadership made the difference in the poll outcome of the Assembly elections in Maharashtra and Jharkhand.
The BJP will need to decide on the next chief minister of Maharashtra today itself, else President’s Rule is unavoidable. The term of the government is lapsing today.
The BJP has kept the Maharashtra leaders on tenterhooks on the chief minister issue till the last day of the tenure of the state Assembly. This is despite the fact that the BJP is just a kiss away from the halfway mark in the Maharashtra Assembly.
Political observers argue that the central BJP leadership should read the writing on the wall and hand over the helm of the state to Fadnavis. They argue that the BJP in Maharashtra could rise factionalism because of the presence of Fadnavis.
Besides, Maharashtra, a $1 trillion economy state, should henceforth compete for leadership of the economic engine of the nation. “Fadnavis is the sole BJP leader in Maharashtra who can blend vision for a pragmatic economy while also handling the burden of welfarism thrust on the state,” said a senior BJP functionary.
Incumbent Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde has asked his supporters to not throng his residence ‘Varsha’ in Mumbai. The BJP backed Shinde to become the chief minister to avoid the brickbats for allegedly engineering the split of the Shiv Sena.
Now, the political observers argue, the Maharashtra poll verdict revealed that the followers of Bal Thackeray have aligned with the BJP-allied Shiv Sena (Eknath Shinde). Thus, they argue, the BJP should take the rightful leadership role in the government of Maharashtra.
The central BJP leadership evidently has been averse to promote Brahmin leaders. Fadnavis has a Brahmin background. “On the ground, Fadnavis was the factor of raising the Hindutva to overwhelm the caste identities. To think him as a Brahmin leaders will be a gross injustice to Fadnavis,” added the BJP functionary.
Fadnavis was the Maharashtra state unit BJP president before he became the chief minister in 2014. In 2019, Fadnavis reconciled to the BJP strategy to take a supporting role in Mumbai by accepting the post of the deputy chief minister.
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