Cong-NCP romance ends before marriage

The stiff tug-of-war between the state Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) over seat-sharing agreement pulled out all stops in political maneuvering by leaders of both the parties. It was on again, off again a week back, back to the table in the last three days, and eventually, on the last day of filing nominations on Thursday, it was finally over.

The NCP is finally fielding seven candidates, who filed their nominations on Thursday. The party, which has till now been in the shadows of Congress, has come on its own this hustings. And this is seemingly worrying Congress leadership which terms the party’s moves as a ‘loose cannon’. The NCP state president Jayant Patel, also known as Bosky, is a close relative of Union aviation minister and NCP strongman, Praful Patel. Bosky’s popularity and strength is believed to be growing gradually with perhaps subtle support from the BJP.

Reliable sources in the Congress claim that though the NCP candidates may not win the seats they are contesting on, they can cause significant damage to Congress candidates on at least three seats. “The relationship was crumbling even during the state assembly elections where the NCP contested on seven seats in a tie-up with Congress and won on three. Bosky had publicly alleged Congress leaders of being instrumental in working against his candidates despite the tie-up. Moreover, senior Congress leaders at the helm may not be comfortable with the rise of another Patel league in the party,” a reliable Congress source said.

NCP candidate Balwantsinh Parmar will contest in Anand against Congress’s Bharatsinh Solanki and BJP’s Deepak Patel (Sathi). Earlier the NCP state president, Bosky, was going to contest the seat himself, which was beneficial for Solanki as it would have undercut the BJP’s Patel votes, but Parmar will now take on Solanki’s Kshatriya votes.

Interestingly, Bosky changed his decision to contest on the advice of senior Congress leaders, warring with the Solanki faction. Bosky, MLA from Sarsa assembly in Anand seat, is a vocal critic of Solanki. In the Ahmedabad (East) seat, the NCP has put up a Patel candidate, which will affect Congress’s Deepak Babariya’s prospects while the Congress is keeping its ear to the ground on their Patan candidate.

Praful Patel is believed to be keen on expanding NCP’s base in Gujarat. Moreover, the NCP has a few workers in only some districts, and if candidates are not fielded, they have nothing much to do till the next elections. “If we had not fielded candidates this time, our party structure would have been virtually shattered,” an NCP leader said.

Moreover, Congress’s indecision on the NCP till the last minute also infuriated the party leadership, as did the fact that none of the seats they had sought from Congress were allocated to them. “Congress had not done any analysis on what seats they would like to give to the NCP. Moreover, Bosky was out of the country till earlier this week, and in the meantime, there was no communication from them. When he came back, he rejected Congress’s offer, and hastily declared eight candidates. Later, the NCP central leadership reprimanded him, and they returned to the table, but finally it seemed convenient to all parties to keep the tie-up at bay,” a source said.

Whether this will alter the support of the NCP’s three MLAs in the state assembly is not known yet.