Kiran Tare By

MUMBAI: Maharashtra Industries Minister Narayan Rane has knocked on the doors of Prime Minister Narendra Modi through a mediator to facilitate his entry in the BJP after Union Minister for Shipping Nitin Gadkari red flagged his entry, a source said.

Rane, a former Shiv Sena leader and Chief Minister during the BJP-Sena Government, is desperate to leave the Congress because he feels that the party did not utilise his ‘potential’.

“Rane is expecting a big role in the BJP. But Gadkari is not in a mood to give him any important assignment. So he has roped in a city-based Gujarati industrialist as a mediator to reach out to Modi to facilitate his entry into the party. Now, it depends on Modi whether to open the party’s doors to him,” a source close to Rane said.

He is furious with the Congress after his son Nilesh was defeated by Shiv Sena’s Vinayak Raut in the recently held Lok Sabha elections from Sindhudurg constituency. He believes that Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan did not take any stringent action when the NCP workers rebelled against Nilesh’s candidature.

Chavan had held a meeting with Rane after the news came out that he may quit the party. The Chief Minister was said to have apologised to Rane for not taking his grievances seriously.

Rane, a firebrand leader, is trying to project himself as a mass leader, who can fill the vacuum in the BJP following Gopinath Munde’s death. He has a good hold in Konkan, where he comes from. However, the opposition from the RSS and Sena pose major hurdles in his way.

“We have told the BJP that it can induct Rane on its own responsibility. If he comes in we will not cooperate,” a senior RSS leader said. The RSS has apprehensions about Rane due to his past image as a street fighter.

Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray is not likely to appreciate Rane’s association with the BJP. He had quit the Shiv Sena in 2005 raising questions over Uddhav’s leadership.