Political dynamics favour Shinde's wife

PUNE Political dynamics in Solapur have vastly improved the prospects of Maharashtra chief minister Sushilkumar Shinde’s wife, Ujwala, who is contesting from Solapur, one of the key constituencies in Maharashtra.
While the first big relief for Ujwala was BJP sitting MP Pratapsinh Mohite-Patil’s refusal to contest the polls (owing to pressure from his brother and deputy chief minister Vijaysinh Mohite-Patil), this time round it is the withdrawal of Samajwadi Party candidate and Lingayat community leader Ravikant Shankarappa Patil from the fray.
Patil, who had contested as a Janata Dal candidate in 1996, had created a stir by splitting the votes, which led to the defeat of then sitting Congress MP Dharmanna Sadul and the victory of the BJP’s Lingaraj Valyal.
Significantly, Patil has not only withdrawn from the fray, but has also declared support to Ujwala. This has changed the Solapur electoral scenario — from a three-cornered contest to a direct fight between Ujwala and the BJP’s Subhash Deshmukh.
In the September 2003 by-election, the BJP’s Pratapsinh Mohite-Patil had trounced the Congress’ Anandrao Deokate with the tacit support of his elder brother and senior NCP leader, Vijaysinh.
The loss of the seat on the CM’s home turf had personally embarrassed CM Shinde and had hurt the Congress badly.
Explaining Pratapsinh’s refusal to contest this time, BJP city unit chief Kishor Deshpande said top Congress and NCP leaders pressurised him to stay away from contesting.
Pratapsinh’s absence will clearly hurt the BJP, especially since a section of the NCP cadre campaigned and voted for him in the elections.
However, both the parties are taking enormous efforts to win the seat. While deputy prime minister L.K. Advani’s first public meeting, under the Bharat Uday Yatra in Maharashtra was held at Solapur on March 15, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and NCP supremo Sharad Pawar held their first joint campaign rally here on April 1.
During the rally, Pawar asked Vijaysinh to take charge of the election campaign for Solapur, Pandharpur and Osmanabad, which was significant in the backdrop of allegations that NCP workers had campaigned for Pratapsinh.
While this is a maiden electoral contest for Ujwala, party workers say she has an excellent rapport with the grassroots cadre, youth and women. BJP’s Deshmukh, on the other hand, has been the Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s (VHP) district organiser for 20 years. He became a member of the legislative council in 1997.
During his term, Deshmukh raised and strengthened the Lokmangal group, which includes a private sugar factory, departmental stores and a milk federation. Though not as popular as Pratapsinh, he is quite a public face, thanks to Lokmangal.
Both the parties (BJP and Congress) seem to be intent to politicise the issues facing the constituency, like sick spinning mills, unemployment, lack of industrialisation and drought. Congressmen and BJP leaders have been accusing the central and state governments, respectively, for not disbursing adequate drought relief.
While Shinde recently announced concessions for spinning mills and the setting up of a university at Solapur, Deshmukh said he would fight the elections on the development plank and solicit votes on basis of the NDA government’s performance.
The BJP plans to emphasise that Solapur had seen little development despite being the chief minister’s home constituency.