Munde to lead BJP in state Assembly polls

PUNE: Narednra Modi’s success in Gujarat seems to have prompted the Maharashtra BJP to redraw its strategy. A day after the saffron surge in Gujarat, the party announced that former deputy chief minister Gopinath Munde will be the lead the party in the next Assembly elections. Announcing the move state BJP president Nitin Gadkari also said that the party will free Maharashtra from load-shedding in two years, if elected to power.

The move to name Mr Munde to lead the polls assumes significance since he has always been reluctant to contest state polls. Mr Munde, the national vice-president of the party, wanted to fill the void created by the untimely demise of Pramod Mahajan. But, it seems that his state unit chief doesn’t want to leave him. “We are preparing a vision 2020 document for the state. If we come to power, we will end load shedding in two years, wipe out debt burden in five years and also stop farmer suicides,” said Mr Gadkari at a media meet here on Monday.

The state BJP chief claimed that there was no differences in the saffron camp. “We work together and currently, there are no differences between us,” Mr Gadkari said. He, however, didn’t mention the Sena’s anti-BJP stand in Gujarat where it had fielded as many as 40 candidates against the BJP.

Attacking the Vilasrao Deshmukh government he said that it was suffering from “paralysis of governance”. According to him law and order situation in the state has collapsed to such an extent that a murder takes place in every three hours. He also held the government responsible for the financial mismanagement. “The state has debt burden of Rs 1.47 lakh crore.

There is load shedding of 16 hours and the industry is going through a difficult phase,” said Mr Gadkari.
On the debate whether the Gujarat elections verdict is victory of Mr Modi or that of BJP, Mr Gadkari said, “Undoubtedly BJP has won Gujarat elections under the leadership of Mr Modi. But BJP had a strong vote bank in Gujarat even before Mr Modi became the chief minister. BJP used to get 45% votes even then. Because of Mr Modi, BJP’s votes increased by 5%.”

He played down the much-speculated meeting on Sunday between NCP leader Sharad Pawar and Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray claiming that it was a pre-planned visit to enquire into the health of Mr Thackeray.