Maharashtra CM's slow and steady style wins him no fans

“For us, two Ps are very important — personal work and public work. Neither personal work nor public ones are done in the reign of Prithviraj Chavan,” said a central Mumbai MLA when he was asked if the CM had made any difference in the lives of the people of Maharashtra.

Chavan has had little impact on people’s lives, even 10 months after taking charge. Not only MLAs but also the general public feels the same. MLAs need to take an appointment to speak or meet the CM. MLAs say this has happened for the first time, they had never experienced such hierarchy earlier.

“I will show the emails I get from the CM. Whenever I write about problems or any specific work that need his attention, I get an email with an answer, but no solution. I don’t think this is the way work should be done,” said another MLA. “We could meet Vilasrao Deshmukh anytime… decisions were taken quickly.

Not only development projects, but also policy decisions are stuck for the past
10 months.

“Think of any development project — be it the Mantralaya makeover or the Bandra Government colony or the Mumbai Transharbour link or the Mihan project in Nagpur — nothing has happened. No policy decisions have been taken on major projects,” a minister said. “If you look at last four cabinet meetings, the CM has formed three sub-committees to take policy decisions. Maxi cab and legislation for the attacks on journalists are two instances.”

An IAS officer, however, had a different take. “He is treading cautiously, but steadily. You may accuse him of being slow, but you cannot accuse him of being corrupt or unfair,” the officer said. “He stalled the real estate and development projects soon after taking charge; but a few have now been cleared. Be it the case of giving additional FSI to cessed buildings or okaying the Bhendi Bazaar project, he has been cautious. There is no room left for controversies or allegations of corruption.”

If you ask Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) ministers to choose their favourite chief minister among the four they have seen in the past 11 years of the Congress-NCP coalition government, the answer would be unanimous: Vilasrao Deshmukh.

Deshmukh was the CM for more than 8 years and he hardly had any dispute with his NCP colleagues. Such is not the case with the present CM. A top NCP minister told DNA that hundreds of files have piled up in the CM’s office awaiting clearance. Even routine files are not being cleared. “There is unrest in the council of ministers as decisions are being delayed unreasonably. The situation is so bad that even Congress ministers have started approaching deputy chief minister and finance minister Ajit Pawar for getting the files cleared,” the minister said.

A Congress MLA said Chavan was more concerned about his image. “He does not want any controversy, but he should understand that the chair he has occupied needs courage to take a decision. Controversies are not new for a chief minister and the person occupying the post should not be afraid of criticism,” the MLA said. “In this respect, Deshmukh was the ideal leader. He would never differentiate between Congress and NCP MLAs or even opposition MLAs. His USP was his ability to take quick decisions.”

A South Mumbai-based MLA said the decisions taken by the CM about the real estate projects in South Mumbai lacked vision. “He has allotted additional FSI to cessed buildings in the island city; but a couple of his conditions are completely unreasonable,” he said. “Distance between road and the building’s outer line should be a minimum of nine metres as per the new norms. This is impossible in current situation where old buildings hardly have any distance between the two. We do not understand who advises the CM on such issues.”