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Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has taken a dig at state Congress president and his predecessor Kamal Nath over the collapse of the Uddhav Thackeray-led government in neighbouring Maharashtra.
He said that while the Congress had sent Nath to Maharashtra on the mission of saving the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government comprising Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress following a rebellion within the Sena, the attempt proved futile as the Thackeray-led dispensation finally collapsed just the way Nath had to step down from his chief minister’s position in March 2020.
Talking to reporters here on Thursday night about the developments in the neighbouring state, Chouhan said in reference to Nath, “Hum to doobe hain sanam, tumko bhi le doobenge. Aur wo hi kiya, bichare Uddhav bhi chale gaye (We are already sunk darling, but we’ll take you with us. And it so happened that poor fellow Uddhav also went away).”
“The Congress is also strange! Someone who could not save his own government was sent to rescue the one in Maharashtra…The Congress never stops amazing us. There is only one ‘Nath’ (master), all others are ‘anath’ (orphan). The rest of the Congress is orphan,” he added.
The Congress had deputed Nath as the AICC observer in Maharashtra after Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde rebelled against his party along with a group of party MLAs and independent legislators, pushing the Uddhav Thackery-led government to the brink of collapse.
Days after the rebellion, Thackeray resigned as the chief minister on Wednesday. A day after his resignation, Shinde took oath as the chief minister, while senior BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis was sworn-in as his deputy.
Nath had to step down as Madhya Pradesh chief minister in 2020 after 22 MLAs, most of them loyal to Jyotiraditya Scidia, resigned from the state Assembly, reducing the Congress to a minority with 92 legislators in the 230-member House. The development paved the way for the return of the saffron party in the state at the helm after a 15-month rule of the Congress.
The Congress rebels, including their leader Scindia, were later inducted into the BJP. These turncoats contested the assembly by polls with most of them winning it.
Most of these legislators were rewarded with plum portfolios in the Chouhan cabinet, while Scindia was appointed as the Civil Aviation Minister in the reshuffle of the Union cabinet.
In March this year, 63-year-old Chouhan achieved the distinction of being the longest-serving BJP chief minister, breaking the record held till then by former Chhattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh.
