PM Modi’s Western Maha Poll Play, Exploiting Maratha Strongman Vijaysinh Mohite Patil

BJP is a worried party in Bharat today with the I.N.D.I.A. alliance, compounded with on-the-boil Maratha agitations, threatening poll prospects to better BJP’s 303 Lok Sabha tally of MPs. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Solapur visit recently, ostensibly to handover 15,000 homes to bidi workers rallying under former Solapur city’s CPI MLA Narsaiah Adam Master, has deeper political purpose for Western Maharashtra. A source familiar with goings on told shortpost.in, “Maratha reservations issue is backed by every common Maratha Manoos. A Maratha DCM (Ajit Pawar) was strapped on to expand chief minister Eknath Shinde’s political reach to woo the Western Maharashtra belt that Maha Chanakya Sharad Pawar lords over.” Modi’s Solapur visit quietly endorsed his blessings for the Krishna-Bheema rivers interlinking project. The brainchild of Pawar senior’s former Maratha DCM Vijaysinh Mohite Patil was launched in 2003 to alleviate water scarcity in six districts and 31 talukas of Western Maharashtra. BJP’s Chanakya, DCM Devendra Fadnavis relaunched the flagship project a fortnight back in earnest (for completion) although (temporarily) rebranding it as the Sangli flood water stabilization (diversion) project due to ongoing legal disputes with Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh over river water utilization. Before 2019 Lok Sabha elections Modi similarly visited Malshiras in Solapur soliciting the Vijaysinh Mohite Patil family’s sway over the Baramati, Solapur, Mhada, Pandharpur Lok Sabha seats (built through blood, political relations over three generations) in Sharad Pawar’s stronghold. PM Modi’s current outreach seeks to blunt the sympathy wave for MVA, negative fallout over Maratha reservations in the ensuing general elections.