One Chavan, in place of another Chavan sworn in as Chief Minister of Maharashtra today. One Deputy Chief Minister, in place of another Deputy also sworn in. Prithviraj Chavan, Minister who was serving as a Minister in Prime Minister's Office is reprtedly a man with good administrative experience, clean image and in addition to all, a Maratha renowned for reading the pulse of the entire population of that State. Hand-picked by Congress President, Sonia Gandhi, he is entrusted with the responsibility of running the affairs of the prestigious State and whether he would be able to rise upto the stature of a great administrator remains to be seen. Besides running the affairs of a State, he is confronted with the ongoing political wranglings within the alliance ruling the State, mainly between the Indian National Congress and Nationalist Congress Party of Sharad Pawar. Sharad Pawar, a shrewd and cunning politician that he is, could very well be a thorn in the flesh of Prithviraj Chavan while remaining outside. His men all loyal to him are already there in the cabinet and the new Deputy Chief Minister, Ajith Pawar, nephew of Sharad Pawar is a potential threat to him.
Furthermore, three communal parties, Bharatiya Janata Party, Shiva Sena and Maharashtra NavNirman Sena of Raj Thackeray, Bala Saheb Thackeray's estranged nephew are poised to emerge a perennial nuisance to the present regime. Except for Bharatiya Janata Party, which though communal is a national party and therefore not the product of regional chauvinism. But the other two, Shiv Sena and Maharashtra NavaNirman Sena (MNS) the self-styled Marathi Manoos always claim to be the appointees of none other than God himself to look after the affairs of the State - the affairs of the State here means Marathis' Affairs. Those who since centuries landed in that State and those who still flow to the State and those who have already made it their abodes, according to them are outsiders, not at all entitled to be there in Maharashtra, only Marathi Manoos the rightful heirs of the State and hence the outsiders continue to pull on there only upon the mercy of these two communal outfits. The 'sons of the soil' policy holders who had their origins in 1960's apparently born and nurtured by none other than Indian National Congress in pursuit of certain ulterior motives later turned to be a perennial head-ache to that party later and had to witness the massive violence, murders and maiming of thousands of people running business, running taxis as also skilled and unskilled employees leading peaceful and contented lives without doing any harm to anyone - like brothers and sisters mingle with each other - ultimately forcing them to flee to their native places empty-handed. These torture-business still continues and in recent years countless people from North India especially U.P., Bihar and Orissa were brutally dealt with, some got killed and had to leave to their States with the govt remaining mute but not helpless spectators as these communal outfits are being nursed and nurtured even now to cash in on the Marathas' emotional attachment to their home-State especially when elections are round the corner.
These outfits ocassionally raise their ugly,menacing heads and wreak havoc across the State. One month before Adithya Thackeray, the grandson of Bala Saheb Thackeray incidentally a final year BA History student of St.Xavier's College, Mumbai, likewise alongside his Marathi loyalist friends went on a rampage demanding withdrawal of a work 'Such a Long Journey' by Rohinton Mistry from the syllabus charging it with containing derogatory references to Marathi Manoos and made a bonfire of it in public. In fact the fellow had not even gone through it. It was all heresay and that was enough for him to take up cudgels against the University and the Vice-Chancellor was forced to withdraw it from the syllabus. Reading a paragraph from somewhere in the novel is not enough to turn the little Thackeray's wrath against it.
Prithviraj Chavan, at the time of taking charge as Chief Minister of Maharashtra is better advised to face upto these challenges with an iron-hand. And if he too goes the way of a la Vilas Rao Deshmukh and Ashok Chavan, the entire State is certainly to be doomed without much delay. What was puzzling to me was that a Chief Minister, who once reportedly advised the starving farmers of Vidarbha and with their debts upon mounting up and after reaching a point of no return end up by consuming pesticides were advised by him to practise 'Art of Living', a Chief Minister who soon after 26/11 carnage which shook the entire Mumbai as well as the entire country reportedly accompanied the bollywood film-director Ram Gopal Verma along with Ritiesh Deshmukh, Vilasrao's son in connection with making a film by Mr.Verma casting Ritiesh, to the ill-fated Taj Hotel, where hundreds were gunned down by ten LeT militants, was allegedly in hot pursuit of the prestigious post once again, I mean the Chief Ministership of Maharashtra - he is none other than Vilas Rao Deshmukh at present serving in the Central Cabinet.
The other one who resigned yesterday, Ashok Chavan, still swears he is absolutely innocent and that he had not done anything out of the way still hehas been haunted out of his post. Pity him.
No comments:
Post a Comment