Get Instant Loan up to ₹10 Lakh!
Maharashtra: Leader of opposition resigns, may quit Congress
- Vikhe-Patil fell out with the Congress party after it couldn’t secure the Ahmednagar seat for his son to contest
- His son Sujay joined the BJP in March and was named the party’s candidate from Ahmednagar
In a major setback to the Congress party in Maharashtra, senior leader Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil quit as leader of the opposition in the state assembly on Thursday, following prolonged discontent over his son not being nominated from the Ahmednagar constituency.
“Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil has sent in his resignation as the leader of the opposition and Congress president Rahul Gandhiji has accepted it,” Maharashtra Congress president Ashok Chavan told Marathi news channel ABP Majha on Thursday evening.
Two days ago, Vikhe-Patil, whose son Sujay quit the Congress and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in March and was named the BJP candidate from Ahmednagar constituency, had launched a scathing attack against the party, saying the Congress had become a “private limited company where people who had done nothing for the party were trying to revive it”. Vikhe-Patil, however, has not resigned his primary membership of the Congress party. A person close to Vikhe-Patil in his home town Ahmednagar, who did not want to be named, said he may quit the Congress party too.
An official in the state legislature, who did not want to be named, said the resignation will have to be sent to the assembly speaker.
Vikhe-Patil was all set to join the BJP on 12 April in presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi who addressed an election campaign rally in Ahmednagar that day. However, the Congress leader had a last-minute rethink and postponed his decision.
Despite being with the Congress, that too as the leader of the opposition, Vikhe-Patil campaigned openly for his son. He fell out with the Congress leadership after the party failed to convince ally Nationalist Congress Party to give up the Ahmednagar seat for his son. NCP chief Sharad Pawar rubbed it in in March when he said the seat belonged to the NCP and it would not part with it for someone who had made no contribution to the Congress-NCP alliance.
Sujay Vikhe-Patil promptly joined the BJP and got the ticket from Ahmednagar against the NCP’s Sangram Jagtap. The Ahmednagar seat went to polls on 23 April. The Congress leadership took disciplinary action against MLA Abdul Sattar last week for working against the official Congress candidate in Aurangabad, but put on hold action against Vikhe-Patil despite his open campaign against the official NCP-Congress nominee.
“The party leadership did not want to generate any sympathy for Vikhe-Patil ahead of the Ahmednagar poll. Also, he had told some of his supporters that he would wait for the Lok Sabha elections to get over before deciding on his future course of action,” said a state Congress functionary requesting anonymity.
In the last two days, he also attended a couple of meetings with BJP-Shiv Sena workers and focused on campaigning for the neighbouring Shirdi constituency which goes to polls on 29 April.
He told Congress workers and office-bearers in Ahmednagar and Shirdi that since the Congress party could not stand by the leader of the opposition in the state, there was no guarantee that their interests would be protected in the party. The state Congress functionary quoted earlier said Vikhe-Patil’s resignation may have some impact on the Shirdi constituency where sitting Shiv Sena MP Sadashiv Lokhande is locked in a close contest against Congress candidate Bhausaheb Kamble.
The strain between the politically formidable Vikhe-Patils and the Congress has already had visible impact on the Congress units in Ahmednagar and Shirdi constituencies. On Thursday, soon after Vikhe-Patil sent his resignation, Karan Sasane, president of the Ahmednagar district Congress committee also resigned. Ironically, Sasane was brought in as the district chief after then Ahmednagar district president Annasaheb Shelar started working for Sujay Vikhe-Patil along with Sujay’s father Radhakrishna.
Catch all the live action on Elections and get exclusive coverage on Assembly Election Results 2024 with Events and Latest News Updates on Live Mint. Download The Mint News App to get Daily Market Updates.
MoreLess
First Published:25 Apr 2019, 09:21 PM IST
- Top Gainers
- Top Losers
- 52 Week High