As clock ticks away, Cong may get an upper hand in Wardha

NAGPUR, AUG 26: For all his might and skills Datta Meghe is running against time to establish the clock' in the minds of voters. For all...

NAGPUR, AUG 26: For all his might and skills Datta Meghe is running against time to establish the clock’ in the minds of voters. For all her weaknesses, Prabha Rau hopes that the panja’ will lend her a helping hand.Locking horns in a straight fight for the Wardha Lok Sabha seat, both are considered very close to their respective leaders, Sharad Pawar and Sonia Gandhi.

Meanwhile, the BJP has virtually given up the seat by fielding a non-entity in the form of Suresh Waghmare. As if on cue, all others who had any visions of contesting this seat have thrown in the towel giving Wardha the smallest ballot paper (four contestants) anywhere in Vidarbha. The fourth contender is Narayan Chidam representing the Gondwana Gantantra Party.

The BJP’s decision to field a lightweight candidate could be to make things easier for the NCP candidate. There is talk in the RSS and BJP about a tacit understanding aimed to indirectly help close Pawar aide, Datta Meghe win the seat. After a few initial hiccups to his campaign inthe 1998 elections, Meghe had bagged the Wardha seat with a comfortable margin of a little over 83,000 votes.

This time, his biggest problem seems to be registering his election symbol, the clock, in this rural-dominated constituency. “Wherever, he goes people wave their panja at him. They’ve yet to realise the change in symbol,” said a worried Meghe campaigner in Deoli.

With the tremendous campaign machinery at his disposal, though, he’s expected to get around this problem by D-day.

That may not sound too good for Prabha Rau who’s having trouble keeping her own partymen together in the first place. It is well known that she cannot see eye to eye with Pramod Shende and Sharad Kale the two influential sitting MLAs who’re contesting again. They make no bones of their dislike of her and she knows it.

There is also a sizeable section of Congressmen in Wardha who are looking to settle scores with Rau for humiliating them at a Sonia Gandhi public meeting in Pulgaon in March this year. Rau had used herpersonal relations with the Congress leader to schedule the meeting in her constituency. The sitting MP, Meghe, who was then with the Congress was not even offered a chair on the dais with Sonia.

Story continues below this ad

Leaders of smaller stature complain that they were totally ignored, even deliberately shut off from Madam’, and Rau made sure that she hogged the limelight. They’re itching to get even now.