constituency-watch

Updated: Mar 12, 2019 15:21 IST

Politics makes strange bedfellows. The Hatkanangle Lok Sabha constituency in western Maharashtra is an example.

Once bitter critics of Sharad Pawar and his policies, the Raju Shetti-led Swabhimani Paksha, the political arm of the Swabhimani Shetakari Sanghatana (SSS), is now exploring an alliance with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), themselves a joint force in Maharashtra.

The nomenclature aside, to the small land owner in western Maharashtra, Swabhimani Paksha and Swabhimani Shetakari Sanghatana are one and the same; the part of, by, and for the farmer.

Shetti, a friend-turned-foe of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), wants NCP and Congress to leave three seats free for the Paksha/SSS, to contest. If the Congress and NCP fail to agree, Shetti has vowed that the SSS will contest at least 10 seats in the state on its own.

A sitting member of Parliament (MP) from Hatkanangle, Shetti, left the NDA in September 2017 and has since, become a staunch critic of its policies.

Part of Kolhapur district, Hatkanangle is a rural constituency with a large number of sugarcane producers. Shetti, a two-time MP from here, has been leading the cane growers’ agitation for the past decade demanding a higher support price for the produce.

Shetti carried out violent agitations against cooperative sugar mills controlled by Congress-NCP leaders, demanding higher prices for sugarcane.

Reacting to one of his agitations in November 2012, Pawar accused Shetti, a Jain by caste, of deliberately targeting factories owned by the Maratha community.

Rationalising his stand to attempt to go with the Congress, Shetti said, “Congress certainly has not been able to clear itself of all of its sins in the past. However, it is currently the best available option in the political scenario in the country. We have expressed our desire to contest from the Wardha and Buldhana Loksabha constituencies, along with Hatkanangle. While talks are in progress, we will form a pre-poll alliance only if these two seats are given to the SSS.”

From the BJP-Shiv Sena, Dhairyasheel Mane, son of former NCP MP Nivedita Mane, is doing the rounds. Mane recently joined the Shiv Sena, which according to the seat-sharing formula, will field its candidate from Hatkanangle. On the other hand, Congress has decided not to field any candidate from Hatkanangle in support of Shetti.

Nivedita Mane said, “The pre-poll alliance with the BJP will help us defeat Raju Shetti in the upcoming general elections. With the help of Sada Bhau Khot, who will be our star campaigner, we will defeat Shetti by a record margin.”

“Dhairyasheel Mane has been in the public field for very long and people in Hatkanagle constituency have accepted his leadership,” she added.

“Dhairyasheel is successful in mobilising young voters, along with voters who belong to the Bahujan Samaj, which will be instrumental in his victory in the elections,” said Mane.

Political observers feel it will be interesting to see how much Shetti can convince his vote bank to back the Congress-NCP, against whom his own party, the SSS, has been fighting for more than a decade.

The challenge before Shetti will be to convince small land-holders to vote for NCP-Congress leaders, who in turn control the sugar factory lobby in western Maharashtra.

For over a decade, Shetti’s Swabhimani Shektari Sanghatana (SSS) has been fighting against the sugar factories. Now, politics will espouse the strange bedfellows.