Sharad Pawar Initiates Opposition Unity in Goa, but Congress may Become the Sore Thumb

Manas Dasgupta

NEW DELHI, Jan 11: The veteran leader and president of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) Sharad Pawar has taken an initiative to forge an opposition alliance against the BJP at least in Goa.

Pawar told media persons on Tuesday that his party was in talks with the Congress and the Trinamool Congress (TMC) for an alliance in the upcoming assembly election in Goa. “We are in talks with Congress and Trinamool Congress for an alliance for Goa Assembly elections,” he said. He, however, did not say about the Aam Aadmi Party of the Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal which has also announced its intention to join the Goa elections in a big way. In neighbouirng Maharashtra, the NCP is one of the coalition partners in the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government along with the Congress party and Shiv Sena.

In Uttar Pradesh, his party would contest the elections in alliance with the former chief minister Akhilesh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party and other smaller parties. “The people of Uttar Pradesh are looking for a change. We will surely see the change in the state. Communal polarisation is being done in Uttar Pradesh, ahead of Assembly elections. The people of UP will give a befitting reply to this,” the veteran politician said.

Pawar’s apparent reference was to Adityanath’s assertions again on Tuesday stating that the UP elections would be between 80 per cent population versus 20 per cent “who feel pained at the development of Ram Janmabhoomi temple, Kashi Vishwanath complex, who do not want the backward classes to progress and those who do not want any punitive actions against the corrupt, mafias and other anti-social elements.” His hints obviously was towards the 80 per cent Hindu population and the 20 per cent minorities in UP.

When asked about labour and employment minister Swami Prasad Maurya’s resignation from the Yogi Adityanath cabinet, the veteran leader said he was confident that 13 BJP MLAs are going to join the Samajwadi Party (SP).

But all efforts of other parties to form an united front against the BJP in different states may come to naught considering the Congress attitude. While the party showed reluctance to join hands with TMC in Goa, in Punjab, where the Congress is in power, the party is in disarray due to the differences among the party leaders. Meanwhile, Pawar’s call for an alliance in Goa came amid a buzz regarding the Congress and TMC joining hands for assembly elections in the tourist state. However, senior Congress leaders have denied any such development at the moment.

Earlier, the Congress had said it was ready to accept the support of any party that was keen to defeat the ruling BJP. Days ago, TMC’s Mahua Moitra had said the party will do everything possible to defeat the BJP.

“We have already entered into a pact with the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) for the Goa polls. There is a space for one more constituent in our pact. Either the Congress or the AAP can join this pact if they are serious about defeating the BJP in Goa,” a top TMC leader had said.

Election to the 40-seat Goa assembly in February is witnessing a multifaceted battle with the TMC and AAP entering the fray, besides the ruling BJP and Congress. The regional parties Goa Forward Party and MGP have already entered alliances with one of these parties. Both TMC and AAP have announced a slew of promises should they form a government in Goa

In the 2017 mandate, Congress won the majority with 17 seats out of the total 40. The BJP came second with 13 seats.

However, the saffron party managed to secure support from other smaller parties and independent candidates and went on to form the Goa government with the former union minister late Manohar Parrikar as the chief minister. Pramod Sawant was given the state’s reins following Parrikar’s demise and the BJP has managed to complete the entire tem despite leading a minority government.

In Punjab, even as the Congress believed it had overcome the rough weather following the exit from the party of the former chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh, who has formed his own party and has joined the fray in alliance with the BJP and a faction of the Akali Dal, the party is facing new problems from its state unit president Navjot Singh Sidhu.

In a sudden attack against the party high command, the cricketer-turned-politician, who has not kept any secret of his high ambitions to become the chief minister of his home state, said on Tuesday that it would be the voters of Punjab who would decide the next chief minister and not the party high command. “It is the people of Punjab who will decide who will be the Chief Minister and not the party high command,” he said. The latest Sidhuism, a month before Punjab votes on February 14, is certain to raise hackles in the Congress’s Punjab unit and among senior leaders.

“People of Punjab will decide who will be the Chief Minister. Who told you that the (Congress) high command will make the CM?” Sidhu posed a counter question to the media persons who quoted his earlier statement that the Congress culture was to leave the leadership issue to the high command once the party secured a majority in the Assembly elections. “Do not have a false idea in your mind. People of Punjab will choose MLAs and they alone will decide who will be the Chief Minister,” Sidhu underlined.

The Sidhu bombshell comes days after senior party leader and former state Congress president Sunil Jakhar had said the Congress won’t announce a Chief Minister face for the assembly elections. The party will contest the polls under a “joint leadership,” Jakhar had said. Sidhu himself had said last week that it was up to the Congress leadership to decide on a chief ministerial candidate in Punjab, adding that he considered himself a soldier, doing his job and fighting on issues critical to the state, like its debt and fiscal deficit.

Sidhu’s public utterances that are at variance with the party position are fast becoming a recurring event. The outspoken Congress leader had also made unrelenting criticism of his own party government in Punjab and has not spared the Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi. “His (Channi’s) intention is good. But he needs to follow through with budgetary allocation, research and proper policy to salvage the state,” Sidhu had said.

In recent weeks, Sidhu has been heard questioning his government for not arresting Akali leader Bikram Singh Majithia, who has been booked in a drug case under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act. His attack led the state deputy Chief Minister Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, who hold the home portfolio, to say that Sidhu was upset with him. “Punjab Congress chief Navjot Singh Sidhu is upset with me ever since I became the Home Minister. If Sidhu wants the home ministry, then I will put it at his feet in a minute,” claimed Randhawa.