Sonia selects 'trusted lieutenant' Prithviraj Chavan as next CM for Maharashtra  

November 10, 2010

Besides being a 'trusted lieutenant' of the Gandhi family, Prithviraj Chavan’s 'clean' image and Maratha caste tilted the balance in his favour

As correctly predicted by Moneylife (http://www.moneylife.in/article/78/11026.html), Congress chief Sonia Gandhi has selected 'trusted lieutenant' Prithviraj Chavan as the next chief minister (CM) for Maharashtra. He will take over as the 20th CM of the state after incumbent Ashok Chavan was asked to resign due to alleged involvement in the Adarsh housing society scam.

Following the ouster of Ashok Chavan, the names that were doing the rounds were those of Prithviraj Chavan, Sushilkumar Shinde, Vilasrao Deshmukh, Mukul Wasnik, Balasaheb Thorat as well as the father-son duo of Balasaheb Vikhe Patil and Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil. Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi, who was supposed to have supported Ashok Chavan earlier, said that the party wants someone "who is clean and can deliver". This shut the doors for Vilasrao Deshmukh.

Although Mr Shinde is a 'tried and tested' lieutenant of the Gandhi family, he was also named in the Adarsh housing scam and hence was sidelined for the CM's post.

Earlier in 1998, the Vikhe Patil father-son duo shifted their alliance to the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) to become Union and state ministers, respectively. In addition, it is alleged that a firm related with the Vikhe Patil family owes state power distribution company (Mahavitaran) about Rs1,800 crore. Both these factors went against them.

Mr Wasnik shares good relations with Rahul Gandhi, but is seen more as the party's man in Delhi and has no real mass base in Maharashtra. He and Mr Thorat were the lightweight candidates in the fray and would have been easy prey for the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), which shares power with the Congress in Maharashtra.

Over the years, the NCP has increased its base in the state and is very eager to root out the Congress from many constituencies.

Therefore, the question remains, what tilted the balance in favour of Prithviraj Chavan? His family shares a very good equation with the Gandhi family and his mother Premalakaki Chavan was the state Congress chief of Maharashtra. Besides being a trusted lieutenant of the Gandhi family, Mr Chavan comes with a clean image and belongs to the Maratha caste.

Traditionally, the Maratha lobby has ruled Maharashtra most of the times and the same lobby is still dominant in state-level politics. Thus, the Congress high command replaced Ashok Chavan, a Maratha, with another Maratha, in order to keep the equations in the state-level politics intact.

There were rumours doing the rounds that the NCP may also replace its incumbent deputy CM Chhagan Bhujbal, in case the Congress decides to appoint a non-Maratha leader as the next CM. In this situation, Ajit Pawar, the nephew of NCP chief Sharad Pawar, was the frontrunner for the deputy CM's post. Nevertheless, since the Congress has kept the caste-equation unchanged, there may not be any change in the NCP's strategy as well.

Prithviraj Chavan: A brief profile

Born on 17 March 1946, Prithviraj Chavan has a BE (Hons) from BITS, Pilani and an MS from the University of California, Berkeley (USA). He pursued higher studies at the University of California and spent some time working in the field of aircraft instrumentation and designing audio recorders for anti-submarine warfare in the US before returning to India and entering Indian politics. He is married to Satvasheela and has one daughter and one son.

MAHARASHTRA AT A GLANCE

Since 1 May 1960, Maharashtra has seen 19 chief ministers and except Vasantrao Naik, no other CM was able to complete his five-year term in office. Vasantrao Naik, from the Vidarbha region, was also the longest serving (about 12 years from December 1963 to February 1975) CM of Maharashtra. Vilasrao Deshmukh who was CM for two terms of about four years each follows him. NCP chief Sharad Pawar became CM for three times, but was unable to complete his full term in office.

With the exception of the Sharad Pawar-led Progressive Democratic Front (PDA) regime of about two years and the Shiv Sena-BJP combine's term of four-and-a-half years, Maharashtra has been ruled by the Congress since 1960.

At present, the Congress has 82 and the NCP has 62 members in the 288-member house.— Yogesh Sapkale