Today in Politics: From MP to Rajasthan, BJP top brass kick off yatras, as Chouhan, Raje play second fiddle

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to address a meeting of BJP workers to mark the culmination of these five marches in Bhopal on September 25 on the birth anniversary of late Deendayal Upadhyaya, a key face of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, the BJP’s forerunner.

BJP leaders said that these five yatras will cover more than 10,500 km by crisscrossing 210 of MP’s 230 Assembly constituencies before reaching Bhopal.

While Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan had been at the forefront of such events ahead of the 2018 Assembly elections, the BJP leadership has decided to involve Union Ministers, Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari, for the yatras this time.

In the 2018 polls, the Congress won 114 seats as against the BJP’s 109 seats, with the former then going on to form its government under Chief Minister Kamal Nath. However, the Congress government collapsed after 15 months when party leader Jyotiraditya Scindia turned into a rebel and led his loyalist MLAs to join the BJP, paving the way for Chouhan’s return as CM for the fourth term.

Scindia is now Union Minister for Civil Aviation. However, there has been discontent among a section of his loyalists ahead of the upcoming polls. Several Scindia loyalists or BJP leaders from his Gwalior-Chambal home turf have now returned to the Congress and targeted him.

After an open feud with Scindia for three years, ever since he moved to the BJP from the Congress, BJP Kolaras MLA Virendra Raghuwanshi quit the party last Thursday. This was the fourth senior BJP leader from the Scindia turf to quit in recent weeks.

Chouhan is reeling from perceived “anti-incumbency” and a “fatigue factor”, with the BJP appearing to face a stiff challenge from the Nath-led Congress in the upcoming polls.

In neighbouring poll-bound state of Rajasthan, which is ruled by the Congress under CM Ashok Gehlot,

Nadda Saturday launched the party’s ‘Parivartan Yatra’ from Sawai Madhopur and addressed a public rally. Attacking the Gehlot dispensation over crime against women, corruption and other issues, the BJP chief called upon the people to remove the government if they wanted to change the situation in the state.

The BJP’s four Parivartan Yatras, to be launched until September 5, would cover all the 200 Assembly constituencies under which Kisan chaupal, motorcycle rallies, meeting of women, Dalit chaupals will be organised to seek votes for the party.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah will kick off the second of such yatras Sunday from Beneshwar Dham in Dungarpur, which would cover 52 constituencies in 19 days.

The third yatra will be launched on September 4 by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh from Ramdevra in Jaisalmer, while the fourth BJP yatra will be launched by Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari on September 5 from Gogamedi in Hanumangarh.

In Rajasthan too, instead of entrusting the launch of such events to top state leaders like ex-CM Vasundhara Raje, the BJP leadership has assigned the job to the central party leaders in this election.

In Haryana, AAP supremo and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal and his party colleague and Punjab CM Bhagwant Mann will Sunday administer the oath to the newly-appointed office-bearers of the local units in Bhiwani. These office-bearers are called circle in-charges. Each of them has been appointed for five wards in urban areas or for some villages in rural areas.

The exercise is part of the AAP’s continuing bid to expand its base in Haryana, Kejriwal’s home state. It is another matter that the party has not been able to hove any breakthrough in the state so far despite fighting several elections.

In Maharashtra, the Congress is set to kick off a 10-day “Jan Samvad Yatra” from Sunday to highlight the “failures” of the BJP government at the Centre and in Maharashtra.

According to Maharashtra Congress chief Nana Patole, the party leaders will travel through taluka, village and city levels in all regions during the period.

Former CMs, Prithviraj Chavan and Ashok Chavan, would lead the yatras in western Maharashtra and Marathwada respectively. While it will be helmed by Leader of the Opposition (LOP) in the Assembly, Vijay Wadettiwar, in West Vidarbha, Patole himself will lead the march in East Vidarbha.

As part of the programme, all state Congress leaders would tour the coastal Konkan region for two days.

Meanwhile, the Maratha reservation issue has again flared up in Maharashtra, with violence breaking out in Jalna as protesters clashed with police leaving several injured.

Patole alleged that Friday’s police lathi-charge on protesters in Jalna seeking Maratha reservation on the orders of the government, led by the Shinde Sena-BJP-Ajit NCP coalition, was meant to divert attention from the 28-party Opposition INDIA bloc meeting held in Mumbai during August 31-September 1.

The ruling coalition is on the defensive over the Maratha quota issue in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections and Assembly polls, as the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) — comprising the Sharad Pawar NCP, Uddhav Thackeray Sena and the Congress — has targeted it over the Jalna violence.

With barely any solution to the Maratha quota row in sight after the Supreme Court struck down Maharashtra’s Socially and Educationally Backward Classes Act in 2021, it is set to turn into a poll issue again, Shubhangi Khapre reports.

While the ruling coalition would again face the Maratha quota issue ahead of polls — especially the BJP which is in power in both the state and at the Centre — one key difference this time is the point that both CM Shinde and his another deputy Ajit Pawar belong to Maratha community.

(With PTI inputs)