Maharashtra: Vijay Wadettiwar asks Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi to join hands with Congress to save ‘secular fabric’ of nation

Maharashtra: Vijay Wadettiwar asks Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi to join hands with Congress to save ‘secular fabric’ of nation

By Murtuza Merchant -

June 30, 2019

Leader of Opposition in Maharashtra Legislative Assembly Vijay Wadettiwar on Sunday asked Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA), led by Dalit leader Prakash Ambedkar to join hands with the Congress for the upcoming Maharashtra Assembly elections, to save the “secular fabric” of the nation.

The senior Congress leader revealed that the party had offered VBA 6 seats during the recently held Lok Sabha elections and were even willing to stretch it to 7 seats, but Ambedkar did not respond.

“We met (Congress chief) Rahul Gandhi yesterday and discussed the upcoming state Assembly elections. Among other things, an alliance with the VBA was also discussed. (Senior Congress leaders) Harshwardhan Patil and Manikrao Thakre will be meeting Prakash Ambedkar on July 3 an extend a hand for an alliance,” Wadettiwar said, speaking to rajkaran.com.

He further said that while the seat-sharing talks with the NCP are almost finalised, the demand made by VBA would result in a rearrangement of distribution of constituencies.

“There has to be love from both sides. It cannot be a one-sided love affair. Even during Lok Sabha elections, we offered them 6 seats and were willing to give one more. There were 3 meetings held in this regard. However every time, Prakash Ambedkar had a new set of demands. We hope things change this time and the VBA joins hands to save the secular fabric of the country. Fascism has to end,” the Leader of Opposition said.

Maharashtra Congress chief and former chief minister Ashok Chavan on Saturday said the party will enter into a coalition with Sharad Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) for the forthcoming Assembly elections in the state.

“We had a discussion on upcoming Maharashtra Legislative Assembly polls. Talks on the alliance with NCP is almost over. Congress and NCP will forge a coalition in Maharashtra for polls. The discussion on seat allocation is yet to be done. We are open for talks with Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi party,” Chavan told reporters after meeting Congress president Rahul Gandhi in New Delhi.

However, the seat-sharing formula for the 288 Assembly constituencies has not been finalised, he said.

The Congress-NCP alliance in the recently-concluded Lok Sabha elections managed to secure just five seats from the 48 parliamentary constituencies in Maharashtra.

The Bharatiya Janata Party and Shiv Sena alliance, which together won 41 Lok Sabha seats in the general election, will once again test their collective might in Maharashtra Legislative Assembly. The saffron allies will fight on the equal number of seats, they announced earlier in June.

However, the alliance is likely to face headwinds over the issue of chief minister’s post. In the run-up to the general elections, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis in a speech promised “equitable sharing of posts and power” between the two parties.

An editorial published in party mouthpiece Saamna upon party leadership to aim for the position chief minister. The issue is yet to cause some discord between the alliance partners if Shiv Sena goes through with the demand.

“Sena thinks independently despite being in coalition. Mamata Banerjee took a stand-in West Bengal which Balasaheb Thackeray wanted for Mumbai. Balasaheb was criticised when he raised the issue of employment for locals. But today all states in India are working towards protecting their cultures. Seeds of Hindutva sown by Balasaheb have now grown in the nation,” the editorial read.

Barely three days after Shiv Sena in its mouthpiece Saamana claimed that it would want to see the next Maharashtra chief minister from the party, Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray asked Bharatiya Janata Party leaders to not “worry” about who could be the next CM.

Speaking in reference to Maharashtra minister Girish Mahajan’s remark lately where he said that the next state chief minister could be from the BJP, Uddhav vehemently stated that nobody should “poke their nose” into the discussion.

Earlier, Sena leaders Sanjay Raut and former CM Manohar Joshi had suggested that Uddhav’s son Aaditya could become the next chief ministerial candidate from the party.