Leader of the opposition in state council Vinod Tawde, who is at the forefront in evolving BJP’s strategies for the BMC polls, in an interview to Shubhangi Khapre, says when it comes to ground realities nobody can beat the saffron combine as they are the lifeline of Mumbai.How do you explain unparallel rebel in BJP?In all the troubled nine seats, the problems started because of new reservation policy. I admit we should have tackled the problem more strategically. Even now we are trying to resolve the crisis. But I must mention that when the organisation is expanding the aspirations of workers are greater.Do the Cong-NCP alliance have an edge over Sena-BJP-RPI combine?Initially, there was an impression that the Congress-NCP alliance would work.

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But all that was myth.  The entire top Congress leadership in Mumbai has joined hands against Mumbai Congress chief Kripashankar Singh. The Congress leaders fear that their 17-20 seats which went to NCP would harm their prospects in the assembly elections. Similarly, unhappy with the Congress, the NCP is plotting in 7-8 seats. As a result, the Congress and NCP are fighting each other.Will MNS spoil Sena-BJP fortunes?The MNS will not click as they don’t inculcate confidence in people. Five years ago people were drawn to them because they were untested like a clean slate. Their decision to vote for the Congress in bargain to get their three MLAs suspension revoked exposed their politics. On the Marathi issue, one could understand if they had raised the central  issue of according it a classical language status or greater participation of sons of soil in government jobs.After ruling the BMC for 16 years, on what basis the Shiv Sena-BJP is now  seeking votes?The larger question that needs to be asked is what the Congress and NCP, which has been ruling the state for the last 13 years, has done for Mumbai. Were they ever bothered about Mumbaikars?Let’s talk about your responsibility?Let us begin with the BMC-run BEST, whose meticulous functioning has no parallel anywhere in the world. Despite financial constrains it continues to run effectively without burdening the people with hiked tariff. Whether it is extracting license fees or octroi the BMC has not increased its fare in the last five years.

But the BMC has a budget of more than Rs20,000 crore?Of the total Rs22,000 crore, almost 65% is spend on salaries and maintenance of administration duties. Remaining Rs7,000 crore was left to attend to developmental work. The BMC has displayed greater financial discipline compared to the Congress-NCP government’s working at the Mantralaya.What has it delivered to the people of Mumbai?The Sena-BJP has created 200 open spaces. Let them show us a single open space created in the land under them. On the contrary they have allocated the land to builders and generously sanctioning higher floor space index to transform open space into concrete jungle.The state government cannot ignore city development?If builders’ interests are central, it does not serve the people. Not surprisingly, you find several candidates who are sponsored by builders. The developers choose their candidates who would later serve their business interests when elected to the BMC.The BJP is not a holy cow to make such serious charge against rivals?But we don’t allow builders to select our candidates.