Congress heading for collision course with Sena in Maharashtra,’ says Ramdas Athawale

RPI-A chief claims Uddhav Thackeray led MVA Govt will collapse soon as Congress will pull out.

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Pune: Arguing that the Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut’s suggestion that Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar should lead the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) had driven a wedge between the Sena, NCP and Congress alliance in Maharashtra, Union Minister and Republican Party of India (A) (RPI-A) president Ramdas Athawale opined that the Congress would pull out of the tripartite ‘Maha Vikas Aghadi’ (MVA) and Uddhav Thackeray’s government would soon fall.  

“Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut has suggested that the post of UPA president be given to NCP chief Sharad Pawar. However, the Sena is not part of the UPA. This has caused great deal of resentment within the Congress leadership. I think the Congress will withdraw its support from the MVA government and Uddhav Thackeray’s government will collapse,” said Athawale who is the Union Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment. 

He said this while in Aurangabad as part of his state-wide tour to rebuild his party in Maharashtra. Athawale is a constituent of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) claimed that the Sena would be unseated in the upcoming Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) elections. 

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Commenting on the Enforcement Directorate (ED) notice to Sanjay Raut’s wife, Varsha Raut, Athawale said: “If Sanjay Raut is not afraid of the notice as he claims, then he should have no hesitation in facing the ED’s summons.” 

Hitting out at Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) leader Prakash Ambedkar, Athawale said that the former had played with the Dalit voters, but that the former’s tactics had yielded no results in the October 2019 Assembly elections. 

“He (Prakash Ambedkar) had contested all the 288 seats in the Assembly polls but failed to win a single seat. If Ambedkar does not want to unite with us, then he should at least support the NDA so that we can all work together,” appealed Athawale.

Athawale dismissed the contentions that the farmers’ agitation was a pan-Indian one, remarking that only farmers from the Punjab were involved in the protests on the Delhi border.  

“Farmers from other states are not participating in this agitation. The farmers should compromise…while it is a good thing that NCP president Sharad Pawar is holding a meeting of all the opposition on this issue, Pawar should specify what reforms the opposition wants in these new agriculture laws,” Athawale said.