Sena-BJP blame each other for Dilip Deshmukh’s victory

While the unexpected election of Dilip Deshmukh has seemingly exposed the chinks in the Sena-BJP alliance, the outcome has also given further credence to the theory that Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh has a direct understanding with the Sena-BJP leadership, a charge levelled by Deputy Chief Minister Chhagan Bhujbal.

Both BJP and Shiv Sena have blamed each other for the fiasco. According to a senior Sena leader, who was not aware of the outcome of the election, if Dilip has really won the election, then it has been established that the BJP has surrendered to the Chief Minister.

“It is a very serious matter. The BJP had specifically communicated to Subhash Desai that since it was keen to contest the election, he should ask our candidate Ravi Gaikwad to withdraw his nomination papers to ensure the defeat of Dilip Deshmukh. But it appears that the BJP nominee also withdrew from the race to oblige the Chief Minister,” the senior Sena leader said.Expressing shock and surprise over the unilateral decision taken by the BJP to help the Chief Minister, the Sena leader said the issue would be taken up with Sena supremo Bal Thackeray and BJP leader Pramod Mahajan.

On the other hand, on BJP put the onus on the Sena saying the seat was supposed to have been contested by the latter. BJP vice-president Sharad Kulkarni said: “Since the seat was allotted to the Shiv Sena, the BJP nominee withdrew his nomination papers. Our candidate was a dummy and, as such, there was no question of his remaining in the fray,” Kulkarni remarked.

Meanwhile, following a high level meeting between Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh and NCP leader Sharad Pawar, a compromise was reached for the June 17 election to the Upper House.

Accordingly, the Congress has left the Wardha-Gadchiroli-Chandrapur and Parbhani seats for the NCP while there will be friendly contests for the Nasik and Amravati seats since the parties could not come to any agreementAccordingly, Ramdas Tadas will be the NCP candidate from the Wardha-Gadchiroli-Chandrapur constituency against Vijay Raut of the BJP, while Vasant Gite (Shiv Sena), Gopal Gulwe (Congress) and Devidas Pingle (NCP) will be the nominees for Nasik. In the Parbhani constituency, Ramdas Bordikar will be the NCP nominee, while BJP has fielded Brijlal Khurana. In Amravati, there will be a triangular fight between Anwar Khan of the Congress, Ganesh Rai of the NCP and Jagdish Gupta of the BJP.

For the Mumbai Graduates constituency, though there are seven candidates in the fray, the main contest will be between high profile Sena leader Pramod Navalkar and NCP’s Narendra Verma.