Mumbai: By announcing the candidature of leader of opposition in legislative council Dhananjay Munde from Parli assembly constituency, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president Sharad Pawar has set up a title clash in Beed district for the ensuing 2019 Assembly elections. He has pitted Dhananjay Munde the estranged cousin brother of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJPs) Minister for Women and Child Development Pankaja Munde.
Elsewhere in Beed district, the NCP president has preferred to play the dynast card. From Georai, Pawar has fielded Vijaysinha Pandit, son of Shivajirao Pandit, while from Kaij (SC) assembly constituency, he had fielded Namita Mundada, daughter-in-law of late party MLA Vimaltai Mundada. In Beed assembly constituency, the NCP has fielded Sandip Kshirsagar, nephew of Shiv Sena minister Jaydutta Kshirsagar. In Majalgaon, the NCP has decided to once again field Prakash Solankhe, son of late Sundarrao Solankhe, former deputy chief minister.
In the 2014 Assembly elections, out of the six assembly segments of Georai, Majalgaon, Beed, Ashti, Kaij (SC) and Parli, except for Beed seat, the BJP had won the rest of the five seat. Jaydutta Kshirsagar who had won the Beed assembly seat for the NCP, recently tendered his resignation, joined the Shiv Sena and later joined the Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis led ministry as a cabinet rank minister. Jaydutta Kshirsagar is now pitted against his own nephew Sandip in Beed constituency.
In Georai assembly constituency, Vijaysinha Pandit takes on BJPs sitting MLA Laxmanrao Pawar. In Majalgaon assembly seat, Prakash Solankhe takes on sitting BJP MLA R T Deshmukh alias Jija. Architect by vocation, Namita Mundada will take on sitting BJP MLA Sangeeta Thombre in Kaij (SC) seat. The NCP president has not announced the candidature for the Ashti assembly seat as yet.
But the big ticket, title clash will be between Dhananjay Munde and Pankaja Munde in Parli assembly constituency. Dhananjay Munde walked out on his uncle and father of Pankaja Munde, late Gopinathrao Munde in 2013. Barely a year later, a disheartened Gopinathrao Munde then union minister passed away in 2014. Since then intra-family feud between the brother and her cousin sisters has only grown. The move is being seen as a clever ploy to split the Vanjari community to which both the brother and sister belong to.
Announcing the first list of the NCP here on Wednesday, Sharad Pawar remarked that he could not bear the plight of farmers in the state. He claimed that 16,000 farmers have committed suicides in the state in this reign of the BJP led government. The education and marriages of children of farmers have stopped and the government is merely watching it silently. Pawar argued that the previous Congress-NCP led government had waived off Rs 86,000 crore bad loans of the farmers. Today the farmers have to endure the plight of their belongings being thrown on the roads. Terming the unemployment as unprecedented, the NCP chief said that 16,000 jobs have been lost in Nashik alone. Pawar further added that the Marathi Manoos is now slowly vanishing from Mumbai.
