Mumbai: Maharashtra state Bharatiya Janata Party chief Raosaheb Danve led strategic the Election Management Committee has sidelined senior party leader and former revenue minister Eknath Khadse from the core group.
This group will be responsible to various 22 subcommittees that will work under guidance of the six membered core group. The party, while giving the cold shoulder to Khadse, promoted Girish Mahajan, his rival within the party and the Jalgaon district.
Khadse, who is labelled as the man responsible for breaking the 25-years old alliance with the Shiv Sena before the 2014 assembly polls, has been ignored by the party. This was evident from Khadse being put in charge of a Special Contact Campaign Committee in a long list of 22 committees formed by the state BJP to manage the Lok Sabha elections.
Another evidence of Khadse being demoted in the new pecking order is that his one time junior, now Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis’ trouble-shooter, minister for water resources Girish Mahajan being included in the six member election management committee headed by Danve.
Earlier in the day, Mahajan admitted that the BJP had made a mistake in regards to Khadse. Asked why he did not solve the Khadse issue, Mahajan remarked that the issue as far as Khadse is concerned does not know remain.
When asked then why was not Khadse not re-inducted into the state cabinet, Mahajan said, “Khadse himself had stated that he would rather prefer to be inducted into the state cabinet in the second term rather than be inducted in the ministry with just two to four months left.” Mahajan further remarked that Khadse had toiled very hard for the party and that he had his sympathies with him.
