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This is an archive article published on October 5, 2021

Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut to meet Rahul Gandhi in Delhi

The meeting assumes significance as the BJP in Maharashtra has been repeatedly sending feelers to Shiv Sena for a possible reunion of the two saffron parties in Maharashtra.

Sanjay Raut, Shiv Sena, Rahul Gandhi, Maha Vikas Aghadi, MVA, Congress, Delhi, Maharashtra, Maharashtra government, Maharashtra news, Indian express, Indian express newsWhen Raut had met Rahul last month at an all-party meeting, they could not hold a one-on-one meeting. (File)

Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut, one of the key architects of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government in Maharashtra, will meet Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in New Delhi after the latter had extended an invitation to the former for a one-on-one meeting to “discuss various national issues as well as those related to Maharashtra.”

The meeting assumes significance as the BJP in Maharashtra has been repeatedly sending feelers to Shiv Sena for a possible reunion of the two saffron parties in Maharashtra. At the same time, at least two Sena leaders have openly spoken about “BJP being the natural ally of Shiv Sena.” In fact, one of them, Pratap Sarnaik, called for joining hands with BJP so that the ED raids and other problems being faced by Sena leaders would ease.

“Yes, I am meeting Rahul Gandhi today,” Raut told The Indian Express Tuesday afternoon. Sources close to Raut said he was specially invited by Gandhi as he was close to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and the only strong link the Congress has with Shiv Sena.

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“We will discuss all national issues…Certainly, Maharashtra is also on our agenda,” he said.

Raut had met Gandhi last month too but it was during an all-party meeting. He had invited Gandhi to visit Maharashtra and hold a meeting with the chief minister. Raut said he would once again extend the invitation to the Congress leader.

“Raut is a known supporter of Congress. He has been praising both Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra through the editorials in party mouthpiece “Saamna” and therefore Congress has a lot of respect for him,” said a senior Congress leader.

Earlier in the morning, Raut slammed the Uttar Pradesh government for detaining Priyanka Gandhi and described this action as part of an undeclared emergency imposed by the BJP.

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.   Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were  asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died.     Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More


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