Over a year ago, an unprecedented political crisis gripped the Maharashtra government, with Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) collapsing, following a Shiv Sena rebellion led by Eknath Shinde. The epicentre of the crisis, where all the rebelling MLAs gathered, was South Gujarat.
Now, yet again, South Gujarat has played a pivotal role in coaxing Ajit Pawar into joining hands with the BJP.
Sources confirm that Vapi, a town with less than 1.65 lakh people, may have unsettled Sharad Pawar’s Nationalistic Congress Party (NCP). Interestingly, it’s a Vapi-based businessman who has choreographed the present political movement in Maharashtra.
Pawar, NCP leader Sharad Pawar’s nephew, had short-term political dalliances with the BJP and Shiv Sena, but this time he has firmly cemented his association with the former.
And so, this entire operation, it has emerged, has been orchestrated in Gujarat — South Gujarat was at the forefront again — under the watch of this businessman. It is interesting that while it was Surat in South Gujarat that helped Eknath Shinde launch his rebellion against the MVA, this time too it’s South Gujarat that has reconfigured Maharashtra’s political structures.
The exercise to lure Ajit Pawar to BJP began at least 60 days back but considering Pawar’s unshakeable demeanour, everything was kept under wraps. No conversations were made on the phone; no flights were taken that would pique the curiosity among rival parties.
Nobody was involved except Prime Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, Ajit Pawar, industrialist and sports administrator Praful Patel, and this Gujarati industrialist from Vapi.
The industrialist would speak about Modi in glowing terms, applauding his past as RSS pracharak and placing him on the same pedestal as his guru, Swami Vivekananda. He drove down to Mumbai, where he has his office, and then took flights to Delhi to avoid attention. All his trips were presented like routine official visits.
An ardent follower of RSS, he played a crucial role in raising funds for the Ayodhya temple and Kar-Seva.
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