In June, after the Maharashtra Lok Sabha polls, the Bharatiya Janata Party was down and out as allies Shiv Sena and the NCP were making tough demands on seat-sharing for the state polls. In November, when the BJP returned with its highest-ever tally in the state elections, it significantly changed equations within the state.
For starters, the BJP, which was finding it hard to placate the Sena now has an equally strong ally in NCP-which allows it to keep the Sena in check.
The election verdict has also led to the UBT going back to Hindutva, with questions in the NCP-SP camp about the way ahead.
For a party that was planning to better its 2019 Lok Sabha performance, the BJP suffered a rude jolt in the Lok Sabha polls when it won just nine seats, down from its 23 seats in 2019. Faced with demands for more seats in the assembly polls by its allies, especially the Shiv Sena, the BJP had the RSS and its grass root cadre involved again and managed to come back with a mandate that brought the party closest to the 145 majority number.
The verdict, which gave NCP’s Ajit Pawar 41 seats, reduced Sena leader Eknath Shinde’s bargaining power. Furthermore, the BJP’s big win has raised questions about the viability of the Opposition coalition.
Several Sena leaders warned Uddhav Thackeray in a review meeting that joining the Congress-NCPSP coalition did not help the party in the polls. Thackeray is undecided while Sena leaders want to do it alone. Thackeray, who had abandoned Hindutva for two years, now returned to it. Over the last few days, Thackeray has surprised politics watchers with his short meeting with chief minister Devendra Fadnavis. The meeting was important, as since 2019, Thackeray had launched a no holds barred attack on Fadnavis.
Thackeray, who had skipped Fadnavis’s swearing-in ceremony, seems to have realised that in politics there are no permanent friends or foes. The meeting is being seen as a thaw between the two that may possibly lead to something in the future if the BJP’s relations with Sena (Shinde) sour.
Sharad Pawar‘s NCP is also at a crossroads. The Assembly election debacle has meant that the party, barring the two-and-half years between 2019 and 2022, has been in opposition since 2014. Both the NCP factions are predominantly in western Maharashtra. Both have also managed to stay politically relevant through the cooperative sector that retain their influence among the vote bank.
The cooperative sector frequently requires help from both the state and central governments to bail it out. In the past, the state government has graciously handed out help to those with them and shied away from helping those in the opposition camp, which explains why most political parties with interest in cooperatives frequently jump ship from one party to the other. Even if Sharad Pawar choses to stay with the opposition, there is some unease among the NCPSP MLAs over staying five years without power.
Challenges Ahead
Caste combinations
The BJP may seemingly be in a sweet spot politically, however, there are several challenges for the party as well as the state itself.
While the BJP has won the verdict, it has also opened up several caste fault lines in the state, putting the party on tenterhooks.
On December 11, a 45-year-old “unstable” man from the Maratha community allegedly tore the replica of the Constitution near Babasaheb Ambedkar’s statue in Parbhani. The incident led to widespread riots, with the Dalit community vandalising property and attacking police personnel and other businesses in Parbhani.
While the Maharashtra government has claimed that the perpetrator was mentally unstable, the fact that the man belonged to the Maratha community has led to Dalit anger. What has complicated matters further for the Maharashtra government is that one of the persons arrested for the vandalism died in police custody. The Dalit community has claimed that the youth was tortured in police custody which led to his death.
The other incident is that of the kidnapping and death of a sarpanch of Massajog village in Beed, Santosh Deshmukh. Deshmukh was kidnapped and killed on December 9. The incident has led to caste tensions in Marathwada. Deshmukh belonged to the Maratha community while a few of the accused belonged to the Vanjari community. The Vanjari, who are OBCs, are at loggerheads with the Maratha community over being included as OBCs in order to get reservation.
The Maharashtra government has been trying to explain that Deshmukh’s death did not have any caste angle and it was the result of a monetary/extortion angle. Yet, with Maratha leader Manoj Jarange Patil getting involved and the Maharashtra opposition claiming that those involved in the crime are connected with NCP minister Dhananjay Munde himself from the Vanjari caste, the Maharashtra government is on the back foot.
One of the reasons for the BJP and its allies to cross the 230 mark besides the freebies was the RSS working on the ground getting all the castes and communities together and the ‘Katenge toh batenge and ‘Ek hai to safe hai’ slogan, which highlighted the dangers of Hindus being divided on caste lines. However, the two incidents show that any incident can potentially shake the BJP’s plot.
While the BJP and its allies have got an absolute majority, caste tensions can keep the government on tenterhooks. The 2029 parliamentary and assembly polls may be far away, but the caste fissures will cause problems for the BJP much sooner, as the local body polls are going to be held across the state.
The opposition in the state has already decided to capitalise on it by announcing that it would go to Parbhani to express solidarity with the Dalit protestor who died in judicial custody, and also to Beed, where Deshmukh was killed. To make matters worse, Jarange Patil has already announced that he will go on an indefinite fast in Jalna from January 25, seeking inclusion of the Maratha community in the OBC category.
The BJP and its allies would not just like to win to keep the pressure on the opposition, but also to quell any questions on the EVMs that could arise if the opposition wins again. The Maharashtra opposition has been claiming that the BJP lets the opposition win smaller elections while winning bigger states.
The caste equations are not the only sore spot for the BJP-led government.
Freebies
The Maharashtra government has been giving ₹1,500 to women under the ‘ladki bahin yojana’. The BJP had promised ₹2,100 if it came to power. This, however, may take some doing as the state faces a debt of more than ₹7 lakh crore.
The state government, while executing the scheme, has been lenient in its scrutiny of applicants, which means that those who are not eligible are getting payouts under the scheme. The Maharashtra government would have to prune this list as the annual expenditure for the scheme is a whopping ₹46,000 crore.
Pruning the scheme would be prudent because otherwise it would leave very little for the government to spend on infrastructure, education and healthcare.
