Launching a fresh salvo at Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari, the Shiv Sena has alleged attempts to delay the appointments to the state legislative council from the governor’s quota. It compared the situation to former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s Emergency, where instruments of the state like the legislature were under pressure.
Shiv Sena Rajya Sabha Member of the Parliament (MP) Sanjay Raut also alleged attempts by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to oust the Shiv Sena-Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)-Congress Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government by October, but claimed these conspiracies would come a cropper.
In his weekly column on Sunday, in the mouthpiece Saamna, Raut, who is also the daily’s executive editor, charged that the BJP was making attempts to catch the MVA regime in a pincer. “The opposition feels that the 12 names recommended by the government must not enter the legislative council,” said Raut.
Pointing to reports that the governor was not too eager to approve the MVA’s list of 12 nominees, the Sena leader added “… the appointment of these 12 members will be kept pending till October. Why specifically October? Because there are bets being placed on how the present government in Maharashtra will be pulled down at any cost by October. The regime that will come into power later will appoint these 12 members. But this is day dreaming. There is no danger to the government.”
Raut alleged that this politics being played was ‘unnecessarily denigrating’ the constitutional position of the governor, and added that the governor had to take preventive steps if someone was playing politics in his name.
He added that the governor, who was a ‘gentleman,’ had been appointed by the union Home ministry, as was the formality, and hence, had to toe its line.
“At the moment, the entire government machinery in the country has been politicised,” alleged Raut. He pointed to how former chief minister and incumbent Leader of the Opposition Devendra Fadnavis had admitted in a recent interview that home minister Amit Shah had played a role in his early morning swearing-in with the NCP’s Ajit Pawar.
