Smaller parties key to success of BJP’s ‘Mission 45’ in Maharashtra

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) might be in the driver’s seat in Maharashtra with the Ajit Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) faction joining the ruling dispensation, but its ties with smaller parties will determine the success of ‘Mission 45’: the BJP’s aim of winning 45 out of the State’s 48 Lok Sabha seats in next year’s general election.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) might be in the driver’s seat in Maharashtra with the Ajit Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) faction joining the ruling dispensation, but its ties with smaller parties will determine the success of ‘Mission 45’: the BJP’s aim of winning 45 out of the State’s 48 Lok Sabha seats in next year’s general election.

Several of these parties are either part of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance or plan to contest the poll independently. Should they go solo, the advantage will lie with the BJP as smaller parties threaten to claw into the traditional vote bank of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), the Opposition alliance comprising the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT), the Sharad Pawar-led NCP, and the Congress.

Raju Shetti, who heads the Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatana (SSS) and has allied with both the BJP and the MVA in the past, wields influence over pockets in the ‘sugar belt’ districts of Sangli, Kolhapur and Satara, and claims a core base of 4.5 lakh voters.

A former two-time MP from Hatkanangale in Kolhapur, Mr. Shetti’s party, with its focus on providing fair and remunerative prices to farmers and fighting against rising fertilizer costs and diesel prices, is attempting to present itself as a political alternative to the rural electorate in western Maharashtra and parts of Marathwada.

The SSS, however, faces competition from two parties that claim to be farmer-centric: Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao’s Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), and former Maharashtra Minister Sadabhau Khot’s Rayat Kranti Sanghatana, a BJP ally.

The BRS has been decried by the Congress and the Shiv Sena (UBT) as the BJP’s ‘B-team’, while Mr. Khot, a former close aide of Mr. Shetti and now his bête noire, presents a threat to both the MVA and Mr. Shetti.

Prahar Janshakti Party, led by four-term MLA Bacchu Kadu, who holds influence in Amravati and Buldhana districts, is a vital BJP ally. Mr. Kadu was the most important of the 10 Independents who backed Chief Minister and Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde’s coup against the Thackeray-led Sena.