Journalism of Courage
EVEN AS talk has been on over his own political motivations, one reason being his meeting with BJP leader and Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, senior Congress leader Ashok Chavan has come up with a “disclosure” that has stirred the other side’s ranks.
Chavan has alleged that back in 2017, when Eknath Shinde, the current Chief Minister, was a minister in the BJP-Shiv Sena government, he had come to him with a proposal to join hands with the Congress.
Much water has, of course, flown down the bridge since, with Shinde having revolted earlier this year, only to join hands with the BJP. But Chavan’s “revelation” punctures holes in Shinde’s repeated assertion that he split with the Uddhav Shiv Sena so as to preserve “real Hindutva”, which according to him was getting diluted due to Uddhav’s alliance with the Congress and NCP.
Speaking to local reporters in his hometown Nanded on Friday, Chavan, who was Maharashtra CM in 2008-10, said: “Shinde had come along with a Sena delegation and proposed to snap ties with the BJP. I told him that the Sena should also consult NCP president Sharad Pawar, and if he agrees, I would talk to the Congress’s central leadership. But nothing happened after that.”
As per Chavan, the alleged meeting took place at a time when the BJP and the Sena’s alliance was under stress ahead of the local polls that year. Both the parties went on to fight the elections independently.
NCP state president Jayant Patil suggested they had no reason to doubt Chavan. “His statement could be true. We all know the reason why the present Chief Minister snapped ties with his previous boss,” Patil said, hinting that Shinde’s revolt was triggered by political ambition, same as allegedly in 2017.
For Shinde, the timing of Chavan’s statement is uncomfortable, to say the least. There are just days to go for the Dussehra celebrations of October 5, which will be a big test to determine supremacy between the two Senas. With the Uddhav Sena stealing a march by getting court backing to host his faction’s rally at the Sena’s traditional Shivaji Park ground, the Shinde Sena is going all out for its corresponding show in the Bandra Kurla Complex area.
Shinde Sena spokesperson Naresh Mhaske hit back by referring to allegations against Chavan in the Adarsh Cooperative Housing Society scam, and said the former CM was trying to divert the issue and to stay in the spotlight. Mhaske, however, did not directly refer to what Chavan had said or refute it.
Shinde Sena leader and Minister Gulabrao Patil tried to pin the blame on Uddhav, who was leading the united Sena at the time, while not denying Chavan’s claim either. “What’s the big deal in it? If Shinde had gone then, it must be because the leadership told him,” Gulabrao Patil said.
Apart from causing Shinde jitters, the statement could acerbate the tensions between his Sena and the BJP. The two sides have already shared unpleasant exchanges over appointment of guardian ministers of districts, with a section of the BJP of the view that the Shinde camp is consolidating itself at the expense of the BJP.
However, publicly, the BJP has been cautious, with its Mumbai president Ashish Shelar saying Chavan should “follow decorum in politics”.
For Chavan, the statement helps shut out the unsavoury attention that has been on him for a while. He has been hard pressed to explain not being present for the trust vote of the Shinde-Fadnavis ministry after the fall of the MVA coalition government, and to have met Fadnavis last month during Ganesh Chaturthi.
