Assembly elections in Maharashtra may proved to be one of the most acrimonious contests in recent memory. A former Maharashtra chief minister is trying to make a comeback from the fringes of a political landscape transformed by the Narendra Modi wave.
While Shiv Sena is still trying hard to get Congress and NCP onboard to form government in Maharashtra, Narayan Rane on Tuesday said he would do "whatever" to ensure his party forms a government in the state.
Rane, a Rajya Sabha MP, was a former Shiv Sena CM who then quit the saffron party to join the Congress before floating his own outfit and then joining the BJP. Sensing an opportunity to muddy the waters, Narayan Rane said that the Shiv Sena had been "unsuccessful" in government formation as yet, and went on to claim "I don't think the Shiv Sena will go with the Congress-NCP alliance".
BJP immediately went on back foot, with BJP leader Sudhir Mungantiwar saying, "This is Rane Sahab's personal opinion. No discussion was held on this issue in the BJP's Core Committee meeting."
The mercurial leader, who once called the shots in the coastal region from where the Shiv Sena drew its strength in Mumbai, in known for his fiery speeches. In an interview to the party’s mouthpiece, Saamana, in 2006, Thackeray had said, “He (Rane) began his aggression in the bylanes of Chembur (a suburb in northeast Mumbai). It got a platform because of the Sena. I gave shape to his aggression. I made him what he was in the organisation and he accepts that.”
In the 1960s, former Maharashtra chief minister Narayan Rane, before entering politics with the Shiv Sena, was part of the ‘Harya-Narya’ gang, a street gang operating in Mumbai’s northeastern suburb of Chembur. From then to now, Rane’s journey in politics—from being a corporator, leader of the opposition, briefly CM and a cabinet minister for the Sena and the Congress, to recently forming his own party—has been peppered with allegations of criminal wrongdoings against him and his sons.
Rane started his career with the Shiv Sena in the 1970s and later became the Chief Minister of the State. Rane's political journey is guided by opportunism. He had served as chief minister of the Sena-BJP government in 1999, but got expelled from the Sena in 2005 for revolting against Uddhav Thackeray. Later, he joined the Congress and became a minister. However, he didn't continue in that party for long owing to his ambition to become chief minister. In 2017, Rane quit the Congress and formed the MSP, and became ally of the BJP-led NDA.
