Both leaders cite BJP’s decisive mandate as the main reason for making the switch
It is the season of exits for the already bruised and battered opposition in Maharashtra. After the exit of old-timer Kripashankar Singh and star candidate Urmila Matondkar from the Mumbai Congress on Tuesday, party leader from Indapur Harshvardhan Patil and NCP’s Navi Mumbai strongman Ganesh Naik switched over to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
Harshvardhan Patil said he was joining the BJP as the public mandate is with it.
The successive defections have exposed not just the differences within the Congress but also interparty differences between allies Congress and NCP.
Patil said that despite supporting the NCP campaign in the region wholeheartedly during the Lok Sabha polls, NCP was insistent on keeping Indapur assembly constituency with itself. Indapur falls in Sharad Pawar’s home turf Baramati, a Lok Sabha constituency.
It is believed that Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has promised to offer candidacy to Patil from Indapur in exchange for joining the party.
“It has been four months and neither the Congress nor the NCP has given any clarity to me about my candidature. So my followers impressed upon me the need for leaving Congress and joining the BJP,” said Harshvardhan
Patil.
Another mega exit from Navi Mumbai is that of Ganesh Naik, originally of the Shiv Sena and an NCP leader for two decades since 1999.
Naik left NCP with an army of 48 corporators. His son, former Airoli MLA Sandeep Naik, had already crossed over to the BJP.
But the going is not so smooth for the new rebel as former NCP leader and his bete noire Manda Mhatre is a sitting MLA from Belapur.
In a tough contest, Mhatre had defeated Naik in the last assembly elections.
It is believed that many incumbent BJP leaders in the region are unhappy about Naik’s entry as this may scuttle their prospects ahead of an important election.
“It is the Prime Minister’s Modi’s strong leadership and a slew of decisions that he has taken, like the abrogation of Article 370, that made me decide to join the BJP. The able leadership of the CM in the state on the economic front was also instrumental in my decision,” said Ganesh Naik.
In a veiled reference, the Chief Minister indicated that Ganesh Naik is an asset and the party would use him to take their ideology across the state.
The CM was non-committal about his candidature, given the intense infighting prevalent in Navi Mumbai.
Political analyst Prakash Akolkar said past experience shows that voters do not support such large-scale defection as they know it is not for ideology but for personal political ends.
In the 1980 election, Sharad Pawar, who had floated the Samajwadi Congress, had managed to get 55 elected. But in the next elections, many deserted Pawar including stalwarts like Yashwantrao Chavan and Sushil Kumar Shinde. But many rebels lost the elections and Pawar managed to elect an equal number of fresh candidates in the next election.
Exits from Cong
- Abdul Sattar from Congress joined Shiv Sena
- Urmila Matondkar and Kripashankar Singh (they have not joined any party yet)
Exits from NCP
- Padmasinh Patil, Rana Jagatjeet Singh Patil, Madhukar Pichad and his son Vaibhav Pichad, Dilip Sopal, Shivendra Raje Bhosale, former RS MP Ranjeet Singh Mohite Patil, former MP Dhananjay Mahadik, former state women’s wing chief Chitra Wagh quit to join BJP
- Sachin Ahir joined Shiv Sena
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 "Ganesh Naik, Harshvardhan Patil-DNA")
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