People's Democracy

Lok Sabha Election Scenario In Maharashtra

Ashok Dhawale

THE stage is now set for the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections in Maharashtra, which will be held in three phases --- on April 16, 23 and 30.

POLITICAL  SCENE

The NCP, after its month-long flirtation with the Shiv Sena, which saw meetings between Sharad Pawar, Bal Thackeray and other top NCP-SS leaders, has now finally chosen to retain its alliance with the Congress. But it has in the bargain almost succeeded in wresting the right to contest 24 of the 48 LS seats, as against 21 seats to the NCP, and 27 seats to the Congress last time. At the moment, seat-sharing between the two has been finalised for 41 seats, and there is an intense tug-of-war on for the remaining 7.

The NCP also demanded, publicly at its mass rally at Nashik on March 1, that the chief ministership of Maharashtra must be shared for two and a half years each by the INC and the NCP. This clearly indicates that there will be another big fight for an equal share of assembly seats for the Vidhan Sabha polls that are due in September 2009.

The NCP-SS parleys have increased the bad blood between the INC and the NCP on the one hand, and also between the SS and the BJP on the other. Both the INC and the BJP had earlier threatened to break their respective alliances; BJP leaders had even talked of going with the MNS.

The Shiv Sena then demanded a majority of LS seats, and after acrimonious talks on seat sharing between the two saffron partners, there are reports that the seat-sharing has been finalised --- 26 for the BJP and 22 for the SS, with the SS set to get a major chunk of seats for the state assembly.

But what is really giving nightmares to both the INC and the BJP are the reports that the NCP and SS have had a tacit and secret understanding to support each other in the coming elections despite their respective alliances, so as to increase their own seats and cut the INC and the BJP down to size.

The ultimate aim of all this manoeuvring is to try and instal Sharad Pawar as prime minister in the post-poll scenario, with a solid block of NCP-SS MPs behind him. SS leaders have publicly supported the idea of Pawar as PM. The SS had already broken with the BJP earlier when it supported Pratibha Patil for president, under the plea that she hailed from Maharashtra.

This has led to strident demands from both the INC and the BJP that the NCP and SS must unequivocally declare their support for the candidature of Manmohan Singh and L K Advani respectively for the prime ministership! Both the NCP and SS have steadfastly refused to do so.

The BJP in Maharashtra is in the throes of an internal crisis. The absence of its chief strategist and financier, Pramod Mahajan, has hit it hard and there is constant friction between the groups led by its national general secretary Gopinath Munde and state president Nitin Gadkari. It may be recalled that Munde had last year publicly threatened to resign all his posts in the BJP in protest against Gadkari�s �arbitrary� functioning. The BJP high command had then somehow sorted things out, but the tensions remain.

The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), led by Raj Thackeray, is being clandestinely supported by the Congress and it is being egged on to contest the maximum number of LS seats, so as to damage the Shiv Sena in its citadels. This opportunistic game plan is likely to succeed to an extent.

Like last time, the BSP will contest almost all seats and it is trying its hand at �social engineering -- UP style� by giving election tickets to all castes and communities. It recently nominated four Brahmins for the seats in Pune, Thane, Nashik and Ratnagiri. The INC-NCP are trying to rope in some of the Republican groups to counter the BSP. Ramdas Athavale has for long been with the NCP and R S Gavai with the Congress. The SP has issued a statement supporting Sharad Pawar for the prime ministership and may be rewarded with a LS seat.

Unprecedented money power is certain to play a vital role in the coming elections in Maharashtra, as elsewhere in the country.

THE LEFT

DEMOCRATIC FRONT

In this situation, the CPI(M) state secretariat took the initiative to convene a meeting of the Left and secular parties in the state that were opposed to both the SS-BJP and the INC-NCP. This meeting was held on February 6 at the CPI(M) state headquarters at �Janashakti�.

The meeting was chaired by senior PWP MLA Ganpatrao Deshmukh and attended by S M Patil and S V Jadhav (PWP), Dr Bhalchandra Kanago and Narayan Ghagare (CPI), Pratap Hogade, Manvel Tuscano and Vasant Shirali (JD-S), Subhash Warey, Sanjeev Sane, Datta Iswalkar and M R Khan (Socialist Front) and Dr Ashok Dhawale, Kumar Shiralkar, K L Bajaj and Mahendra Singh of the CPI(M). The Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatana led by Raju Shetty, MLA, also agreed to join the front and some Republican groups are likely to join in the coming days. However, all the above parties have limited spheres of influence.

The meeting decided to set up a Left Democratic Front (LDF) to contest the forthcoming Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha elections. There was unanimity amongst the partners on five basic political issues, viz opposition to UPA and NDA neo-liberal economic policies and support to alternative economic policies; opposition to the crass pro-imperialist stance of both the UPA and the NDA and support to an independent and sovereign economic, political and foreign policy; opposition to communalism, terrorism and regional chauvinism in all its forms and defence of secularism and national unity; opposition to all forms of social discrimination and defence of social justice to the weaker sections; and a balanced development of Maharashtra and defence of the interests of all sections of the working people in the state.

The major issues of the people to be taken up by the LDF as part of its election campaign were decided as follows: growing unemployment, retrenchment and wage-cuts resulting from the global economic crisis; massive price rise and growing poverty; suicides by debt-ridden peasants; child deaths due to malnutrition; virtual collapse of the public distribution system; massive load-shedding of power, a fallout of the corrupt Enron deal; neglect of unorganised workers; closed and sick factories; unsatisfactory implementation of the NREGA and the Forest Rights Act; and crass commercialisation of education and health.

CPI(M) POLL

CAMPAIGN

The CPI(M)�s Maharashtra state committee, which met on February 22-23, 2009, in the presence of CPI(M) Polit Bureau members Sitaram Yechury and K Varadha Rajan, discussed the election scenario in Maharashtra, decided to contest two Lok Sabha seats and unanimously finalised the names of the candidates, which were then approved by the Central Committee.

The candidate for the Palghar (ST) seat in Thane district is CPI(M) state secretariat member, AIKS state vice president, former MP and three-time former MLA, Lahanu Shidva Kom. The candidate for the Dindori (ST) seat in Nashik district is CPI(M) state secretariat member, AIKS state president and six-time winner and sitting MLA Jiva Pandu Gavit.

Last month, the CPI(M) state committee published three booklets for the election campaign. These are: (1) The Global Economic Crisis and the Lessons for India, (2) Communalism and Terrorism: Two Sides of the Same Coin, (3) How to Win the Election Battle, by CPI(M) Central Secretariat member Nilotpal Basu (this is for party activists).

The state committee also gave a call for statewide election fund drive. Its next meeting on March 22 will decide on the other measures to be taken for an effective campaign. The other parties in the LDF have pledged their full support to the CPI(M) in these elections.

In the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, the CPI(M) had secured over 1,18,000 votes in the erstwhile Dahanu (ST) seat in Thane district and over 1,13,000 votes in the erstwhile Malegaon (ST) seat in Nashik district against both the SS-BJP and the INC-NCP. The strength of the party and mass organisations in both the districts has grown in the last five years. However, delimitation has led to as many as four of the six assembly segments in the Palghar seat, and two of the six segments in the Dindori seat being replaced.

POLL PREPARATIONS

IN THANE & NASHIK

Political organisational preparations for the elections in both Thane and Nashik districts have been going on for the last six months. In August and September 2008, a series of tehsil-level party classes were held in both districts and political organisational training was imparted to over 2,500 activists in Thane district and to over 1,200 activists in Nashik district.

On October 19 and 20, two unprecedented rallies of over 50,000 people each were addressed by CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat at Dahanu in Thane district and at Abhona in Nashik district. The full strength of the party and mass organisations in both districts had been mobilised to make these two rallies a grand success and they created a major political impact. Two other impressive rallies were also addressed by Prakash Karat on the same days --- at Vasai (which comes in the Palghar seat) and at Nashik.

The CPI(M) Mumbai committee has taken full responsibility for election campaign in the Vasai and Nallasopara assembly segments of the Palghar LS seat. In this area, the DYFI had taken the lead in uniting various other organisations for a sustained mass struggle on the severe problems faced by lakhs of commuters on suburban trains and this has led to some welcome relief in their plight. The JD(S) also has good influence in this area.

In November and December, mass organisations conducted sustained membership drives and their total membership in both Thane and Nashik districts has crossed a record figure of 1.25 lakh each. Unit to district level conferences of the AIKS, DYFI and SFI were held in both districts and their organisational structure was thus strengthened. AIDWA president Subhashini Ali addressed a 2,000-strong convention against terrorism and communalism, organised by the AIDWA and DYFI at Dahanu in Thane district.

On January 19, as per the call of the AIKS state conference, over 23,000 peasants in Nashik district and over 21,000 in Thane district held demonstrations at several tehsil centres demanding stringent implementation of the Forest Rights Act and NREGA, debt relief to all peasants, a reduction in load-shedding, radical restructuring of the public distribution system, and other burning local demands.

On February 16, the CPI(M) and AIKS organised a massive 35,000-strong district-wide rally in Nashik on the same demands. Intensive preparations in all 15 tehsils of the district were made for this rally and it was addressed by Dr Ashok Dhawale, J P Gavit (MLA), Dr D L Karad, Kisan Gujar, Janardan Bhoye, Sitaram Thombre, Sunil Malusare, Savliram Pawar, Gunaji Gavit, Irfan Shaikh, Laxman Gaikwad, Hemant Waghere, Devidas Adole and others. The district collector agreed to many of the rally�s demands.

On February 17, the CPI(M), AIKS, AIDWA, DYFI and the Lal Bavta Thane Zilla Kamgar Union mobilised over 33,000 people at seven tehsil centres in Thane district for a novel two-day sit-in stir for these demands and many local demands were conceded under pressure of this agitation. Krishna Khopkar, Lahanu Kom, Mariam Dhawale, Rajaram Ozare MLA, L B Dhangar, Barkya Mangat, Ratan Budhar, Edward Vartha, Hemlata Kom, Ladak Kharpade, Shivram Girandhala, Gangaram Sutar, Madhukar Dowla, Kashinath Kakra and Jayaram Janathe led these actions.

Earlier, on January 26, BJP goons severely attacked three Adivasi CPI(M) activists in Zari village of Talasari tehsil (on Gujarat border) in Thane district and threw the seriously injured in the jungle, presuming that they would die. But due to alert intervention by the party, all the three were found, hospitalised and saved. The party naturally retaliated in self-defence, whereupon one former BJP MP and two BJP MLAs came to Talasari and led a morcha of around 200 people on January 29 demanding the arrest of CPI(M) activists. The State Reserve Police (SRP) was called into Talasari to prepare for repression against the party. The CPI(M) acted instantly and decisively, and called for a massive anti-BJP demonstration the very next day on January 30, the martyrdom anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. With just 12 hours notice, the party led a militant 12,000-strong rally on the Talasari tehsil and police station, demanding action against the BJP. This foiled the BJP conspiracy, the SRP was recalled and the BJP culprits were arrested.

Significant events in this election campaign were the two CPI(M) workshops in Nashik and Thane districts --- at Nashik on March 3-4 and at Talasari on March 4-5. Both the workshops, which were attended by over 600 leading party activists, were addressed by CPI(M) Central Secretariat member Hannan Mollah (MP) who discussed four aspects, viz. the CPI(M) Central Committee�s political line for the current Lok Sabha polls; the party�s ideological stand on parliamentary democracy; practical aspects of setting up the election machinery, with special emphasis on the setting up of booth committees; and the role of elected communist representatives. Hundreds of copies of the state committee�s new booklets were sold. On the second day, comrades decided on the concrete tasks in the light of Hannan Mollah�s presentation.

Now, after the Holi festival, the election campaign in both constituencies has begun in full swing.