A day after its architect Sharad Pawar decided to step down as the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president, the Opposition’s grand alliance “Maha Vikas Aghadi” (MVA) – comprising the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress — appeared to be in a state of utter confusion on Wednesday over its future plans in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha and State elections.
Interestingly enough, it has been revealed now that Pawar had been planning to announce his resignation from the NCP chief’s post on May 1 – the Maharashtra day. However, the NCP chief postponed his announcement about his resignation by a day as he did not want to jeopardise the Vajramuth (iron fist) rally held in Mumbai on May 1.
The Vajramuth rally held in Mumbai was one of the three such rallies held so far in the state. Earlier, the first rally was held at Chhatrapati Sambhaji Nagar (erstwhile Aurangabad), the headquarters of Marathwada region on April 2, while the second rally was held in Nagpur on April 14 in Nagpur, the headquarters of the Vidarbha region.
The MVA is planning to hold the fourth Vajramuth rally in Pune – the headquarters of Western Maharashtra – on May 14, followed by one such rally at Kolhapur on May 26 and another rally on June 2 at Nashik, the hub of north Maharashtra.
However, following Pawar’s resignation as the NCP president, the MVa has postponed the Vajramuth rallies of Pune, Kolhapur and Nashik indefinitely. “We have decided to postpone the next rallies because of the weather,” NCP Vice President Praful Patel said.
Though Patel clarified that the decision to postpone the next three rallies had nothing to do with Pawar’s resignation as the NCP president, there are not many takers in the state political circles that MVA had cancelled or postponed indefinitely next three Vajramuth rallies because of unfavourable weather conditions.