Chavan calls coordination committee meet

Minutes after the Sangli municipal polls result,Chavan asked MPCC chief Manikrao Thakre to write to his counterpart in NCP for the meeting.

After Congress and NCP ministers made personal attacks on each other,Chavan,who has put cabinet meetings on hold for two weeks,is worried about governance.

However,All India Congreee Committee secretary incharge of Maharashtra Swaraj Jeevan Walmiki said workers of his party wanted to break the alliance with NCP before the 2014 Parliament and Assembly elections.

“I sense Congress workers want to contest the coming elections alone. They are against an alliance with the NCP.”

An NCP general secretary said,“Chavan did not respond to our demand for a coordination meeting a month ago.”

To make matters difficult for the Congress,NCP will organise a dhadak morcha (demonstration) Tuesday to expose alleged corruption in MMRDA,which is led by Chavan.

The outcome of the Sangli municipal polls,in which Congress crushed NCP,has further strained relations between the parties as leaders continue to make allegationa against each other.

Manikrao Thakre,who sparked a war of words by saying senior NCP leader Jayant Patil may shift his loyalty to Congress, said Monday,“I maintain NCP rural development minister Jayant Patil met Congress president Sonia Gandhi twice in Mumbai. I do not want to make the private discussion public.”

Patil has never denied the meetings but said he met the Congress president as guardian minister of Mumbai. Congress cabinet ministers are angry after senior NCP leader and deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar launched scathing and personal attacks on minister for industries Narayan Rane and forest minister Patangrao Kadam.

They want NCP to apologise. Pawar had called Rane a criminal and Kadam corrupt.

Thakre said,“NCP needled us by attacking Sonia Gandhi. So I broke my silence to say why are you criticising Gandhi when your own Jayant Patil met her twice?

“I never brought up the name of NCP president Sharad Pawar.”