After poor performance in the Lok Sabha elections, the BJP has decided that it would contest the assembly elections under a collective leadership. The party has begun implementing its plan and announced its former state unit chief and former union minister Raosaheb Danve as the election coordinator.
This is being viewed as a major setback for deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, who has been the face of the BJP in all elections since 2014, although Maharashtra BJP chief Chandrashekhar Bawankule said that Fadnavis would be leading the party campaign in the state.
Bawankule announced Danve’s appointment late on Friday night and added that other senior leaders would be appointed to head 16 other committees for the polls. “The decision to appoint Danve as the election coordinator was taken in the core committee,” he said. “He will shoulder the entire responsibility of the election coordination for the state. Nineteen other leaders will head various other committees that are important for the polls.”
Given the unrest in the Maratha community and the anger that Marathas and their representative Manoj Jarange-Patil hold against Fadnavis, the party has decided to play up other faces. “Projecting Fadnavis as the leader could cost the party dear in the assembly polls,” said Bawankule. “Therefore, we will choose different leaders in specific regions to woo different communities.”
To this end, OBC leaders like Pankaja Munde, Ram Shinde and Bawankule himself, and Maratha leaders like Ashok Chavan and Chandrakant Patil are expected to be chosen to woo different communities. “Raosaheb Danve is a Maratha from Marathwada, where the party performance in the Lok Sabha election was very poor,” said Bawankule.
The leader said that the formation of such committees for elections was happening for the first time. “We had an election management committee headed by Shrikant Bharatiya for the Lok Sabha election, but such a structure is being introduced for the first time,” he said.
“This was decided in the core committee meeting held in Delhi immediately after the Lok Sabha poll results. The central leadership is directly handling election-related affairs in Maharashtra as indicated by the frequent meetings held by union minister Bhupendra Yadav and Ashwini Vaishnaw, who are in-charge and co-incharge respectively. They recently changed some of the decisions taken by the state unit of the party.”
Bawankule, however, said that Fadnavis would lead the party in the election. “He is our leader and the assembly elections will be fought under his leadership,” he emphasised. “The BJP’s state leader is Fadnavis; Raosaheb Danve is the state’s election coordinator.”
Another BJP leader believed otherwise. “Although our party leaders have been saying that Fadnavis is their leader, the central leadership has been systematically divesting him of his powers,” he said.
Within days of the Lok Sabha debacle, Fadnavis had expressed his desire to be relieved of the responsibility of his deputy chief minister post. He had said he was going to request the party’s central leadership to allow him to work solely at the organisational level in the assembly polls for better results.
The central leadership had turned down the request. At the same time, however, it decided to develop a collective leadership in the state.
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