Still to recover from its pathetic performance in last year’s lok Sabha and Assembly polls, a somewhat desperate Congress has fallen back on its controversial former Chief Minister Ashok Chavan to improve its vastly eroded stock in Maharashtra, while it has ventured to appoint its former MP Sanjay Nirupam as its Mumbai unit chief to make its presence felt in the metropolis through his aggressive brand of politics.
Given that he has yet to clear his name in the Adarsh and “paid news” scams, Chavan’s appointment as the Maharashtra Congress chief, on Monday, clearly reflected the “limited choice” the Congress had before it on the choice of candidates for the post. His tainted image notwithstanding, Chavan brings some stature to the table both in terms as a person with experience in running the Government and as the one having some organisational skills.
Though some in the Congress do not see Ashok Chavan as the right choice for the post, the move is being seen by some others as a calculated risk taken by the party to combat the powerful ruling BJP, Shiv Sena and the erstwhile ally NCP in athe the State. The first of challenges that Chavan has are the crucial elections to Municipal Corporations of Aurangabad and Navi Mumbai, due in the coming weeks.
Though another former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan stands out among all the party leaders in the State, the Congress could not have gone back to him as he had led to party to embarrassing defeats in both the lok Sabha and Assembly polls in the state. Nor it would it have settled down on the Sena functionary-turned-senior disgruntled Congress leader Narayan Rane or a second-rung senior leader like Patangrao Kadam from western Maharashtra.
Ashok Chavan, who had resigned as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra on November 9, 2010 for his alleged complicity in the Adarsh scam, was one of the only two Congress candidates to have been elected to lok Sabha from Maharashtra. Ahead of the October 2014 Maharashtra Assembly, he had been appointed as the party’s election co-ordination committee chairman.
Even in the choice of Nirupam as its Mumbai unit chief, the Congress appears to have given some thought. The party expects to make the most of aggressive brand of politics that Nirupam has practised both as an erstwhile Shiv Sena functionary and later as a man who made his presence felt in the Congress as an aggressive leader who could consolidate the party’s support among the north-Indians in the metropolis. He has in recent years been involved in politics of agitation – be it against power tariff and issues of urban infrastructure.
Fifty-six-year-old Chavan, son of late Congress leader Shankarrao Chavan, replaces Manikrao Thakre, who was continuing in the post despite having put in his papers after the party’s rout in the lok Sabha polls nine months ago.
Nirupam, who lost to BJP's Gopal Shetty in the north Mumbai constituency in the last year’s lok Sabha polls, comes in place of Prof Janardhan Chandurkar, who had resigned from his post after the party’s rout in the Assembly polls in the metropolis.
The appointment of Chavan and Nirupam as the chiefs of the Congress’ Maharashtra and Mumbai units respectively evoked triggered angry reactions from within the State Congress circles.