BRACING FOR THE BIG BATTLE
Administrative goodwill, a can-do reputation and effective publicity—Devendra Fadnavis seems to have the right weaponry for the forthcoming state assembly election
Devendra Fadnavis seems to have all the right weapons for the forthcoming state assembly election
In the past fortnight, no less than a hundred intellectuals gathered, first in Pune and then in Aurangabad, to give the Devendra Fadnavis government a collective thumbs up. The meetings, organised by the forum ‘Academics 4 Devendra’, declared the chief minister an ‘able administrator’ and ‘honest politician’. The gatherings were part of Fadnavis’s all-out efforts, in the run-up to the state assembly election, to establish himself as a dynamic mass leader. To this end, the forum, launched by Fadnavis’s well-wishers, has planned seminars and conferences across the state. In similar programmes held so far, participants were asked which of the Fadnavis government’s decisions impressed them the most and what policies should be formulated in the future. The 2016 launch of NGO ‘Anulom’ to
spread awareness about his government’s welfare schemes was the previous big outreach effort. Since the launch, Anulom volunteers have been travelling across Maharashtra, projecting him as the state’s ‘most visionary leader ever’ who brought about unprecedented development. Fadnavis is confident the outreach will pay handsome dividends in the election scheduled in October. Such is the confidence level that the Mahajanadesh yatra, his masscontact programme that got under way on August 2, has been taglined ‘Mee Punha Yein (I shall return)’. The chief minister believes the government’s development work, transparency and tie-up with the Shiv Sena will fetch the ruling alliance at least 220 seats in the 288-member assembly.
Among his government’s achievements that Fadnavis likes to emphasise are 5,000 km of roads built in the rural areas and the piped supply of water to 1,800 villages. “I am not saying we have been successful on every front,” he told india today. “But people are judging us by our good intentions. They are watching us make a genuine effort to solve every issue. That matters a lot.”
Fadnavis claims that at 45 per cent, Maharashtra’s rate of converting memorandums of understanding (MoUs) into actual investment is the highest in the country. “No other state, not even Gujarat or Karnataka, managed a conversion rate over 35 per cent,” he says. “According to a NITI Aayog report, we ranked among the top three [states] in all aspects of development. No other state has achieved this.” His other yardsticks of development are the completion of 27 irrigation projects pending for 20 years and the heavy emphasis on infrastructure, such as the metro rail for Mumbai, Nagpur and Pune, airports and highways.
On the political front, Fadnavis is determined to limit the footprint and following of opposition Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) to a select few pockets in the state. That 17 prominent leaders from these parties have joined the BJP in the past two months only helps. At least another six are reportedly eager to switch. “People from other parties want to join us as they can see how well our party is doing. But we have a policy on inductions. Our doors are open to ordinary workers, but we filter leaders,” Fadnavis says (see interview).
Fadnavis is proud of the many firsts to his name. He is the first non-Congress chief minister of Maharashtra to have completed a five-year term in office. The scale of his Mahajanadesh yatra, covering 152 assembly constituencies and more than 4,200 km, does not find a match among the state’s previous chief ministers. Fadnavis believes his declaration as chief ministerial candidate even before the announcement of the election dates will help cement his identity as an accommodative leader who knows how to handle an alliance and take everyone along.
The steady stream of defections from the opposition ranks and the perceived favourable political climate for the BJP have even prompted some of Fadnavis’s colleagues to suggest that the BJP go solo in the state election. Their calculation is that the BJP could win around 160 seats— more than the halfway mark—on its own. At a party meeting, water resources minister Girish Mahajan, who is close to Fadnavis, reportedly claimed he could win 80 seats for the BJP using his network. “We can easily win another 80 seats in other parts of the state,” Mahajan reportedly argued.
Fadnavis, though, is keen on continuing the BJP-Sena alliance. “We are ready to suffer some losses, but we will go ahead with the alliance. Our victory will be unprecedented,” he says. ■