While there are still rumblings of discontent within the ruling Mahayuti coalition over guardian ministership in some districts in Maharashtra, the Narayan Rane family is calling the shots in the coastal Sindhudurg district, its home turf. Three members of the Rane family are now part of the key four-member team of elected representatives in Sindhudurg's District Planning and Development Council (DPDC), which is mandated to draw up and fund the development plan in a district. While the guardian minister of a district is the chairman of its DPDC, the collector is its member secretary. The MLAs, MLCs and MPs from each Maharashtra district are members of its DPDC, with the panel also including the zilla parishad members, corporators and mayors as invitees. The Sindhudurg DPDC is headed by state Fisheries and Ports Minister Nitesh Rane, the younger son of senior BJP leader and ex-chief minister Narayan Rane. The BJP MLA from the Kankavali constituency in Sindhudurg, Nitesh is the guardian minister of the district. The BJP MP from the Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg Lok Sabha constituency, Narayan Rane is also a member of the Sindhudurg DPDC – and so is his elder son Nilesh Rane, the Shiv Sena MLA from the Kudal seat. An erstwhile BJP leader, Nilesh had joined the Eknath Shinde-led Sena on the eve of the November 2024 Assembly polls to contest the Kudal seat on its ticket as part of the Mahayuti seat-sharing arrangement. The only non-Rane family member in the Sindhudurg DPDC's key team is the Shiv Sena’s Deepak Kesarkar, who is the MLA from the Sawantwadi seat. There are similar cases in several districts involving their DPDCs. Uday Samant and Kiran Samant, both brothers, are members of the DPDC in neighbouring Ratnagiri. Both are the Sena MLAs from the district. In the Kolhapur DPDC, the BJP’s Rajya Sabha MP Dhananjay Mahadik and his cousin and party MLA Amal Mahadik are both members. In Raigad, the guardian ministership row continues days after NCP minister Aditi Tatkare was named by the Devendra Fadnavis-led government as the district's guardian minister. With the Shinde Sena also staking its claim over it, the government stayed Aditi's appointment. But, she along with her father Sunil Tatkare, the NCP Lok Sabha MP, remain part of the Raigad DPDC. However, the case of the Sindhudurg DPDC stands out given the Rane family's near-total dominance over it. Sindhudurg district had been a major stronghold of the undivided Shiv Sena in the past. With the political rivalry between the Rane family and the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) remaining intense and bitter, the Ranes' control of the DPDC is set to help the BJP tighten its grip over the region. Brushing aside criticism of his family for its dominance over the Sindhudurg DPDC, Nitesh said, "I don't think it's a negative thing. We three are in the DPDC because people have elected us. We haven't grabbed those positions illegally. If people have elected us, it is our responsibility to work for the people of Sindhudurg." Nitesh also said: "How does it matter if we are from the same family? We are not going to use the funds of DPDC to build our houses. It will be used for the people of the district. Plus, it will be without any dispute or disagreement." In 2024-25, the budget allocated to Sindhudurg DPDC was around Rs 223 crore. The total budget of the state's DPDCs is about Rs 4,538 crore, which is allocated among the districts based on the size, population, schemes and demands flagged by their administration. The DPDCs scrutinise proposals for local development from various quarters and approve them; review proposals for grants to schools and other institutions; provide grants for production-linked incentives, and plan and implement infrastructure development schemes, among other things. The development works cleared by the DPDCs are implemented by the district collectors and the zilla parishad CEOs on the ground. The guardian minister is the final authority in allocation of the DPDC funds for local development works for the entire district. The post is thus considered politically significant. With three members of the Rane family part of the DPDC, the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), especially its key constituent Uddhav Sena, is set to face an uphill task in the coming urban and rural local body polls in the Sindhudurg region.
