NCP infighting: RR Patil takes pothole route to target Chhagan Bhujbal

The Nationalist Congress Party is caught in a new power tussle. A few leaders are trying their best to clip the wings of deputy chief minister Chhagan Bhujbal for being the unchallenged OBC leader in the state.

Several leaders and ministers in the NCP have tried to unsettle Bhujbal, who still has the maximum mass base in the state. The first signs of discord came to the fore when home minister RR Patil asked people to boycott toll payment on roads filled with potholes. Though he has not directly named Bhujbal, it created a flutter in the NCP because everyone understood that he had targetted the ministry of public works department. And Bhujbal is the PWD boss.

The fight for power in the NCP is nothing new. A senior general secretary said that Patil decided to strike at Bhujbal when he was basking in the glory of OBC politics.

Bhujbal has been lobbying hard at the Centre for the caste census. He has tried to persuade the prime minister and other top cabinet ministers to accept the concept as that would bring out the exact data on OBCs.

A source said that Patil is not the only one targeting Bhujbal. Party vice-president Vinayak Mete too has stepped up his demand for reservation for Marathas.

“To defeat the consolidation of OBCs in Maharashtra under Bhujbal’s banner, the top leadership is promoting ministers to prop up new demands based on their community,” a political analyst said.

At an internal meeting of the organisation, a senior minister is learnt to have said that there should be a separate reservation of five per cent for ‘matang’ (backward community).

A minister who is against caste-based census said that the party should not support Bhujbal’s demand for OBC reservation in the state assembly and parliamentary elections.

Another minister said decisions regarding OBCs should be taken collectively and not by Bhujbal alone.

A close aide of Bhujbal, however, said that the OBC leader knows that NCP boss Sharad Pawar supports him. “And that is all that matters,” he said.