Loyalty of alliance partner towards each other is the decisive feature of the 2009 elections in Maharashtra.
There are issues like farmer’s suicides, long hours of power cuts in the rural and semi urban areas, the crumbling urban infrastructure, etc. However in 2004 the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party- Shiv Sena (BJP-SS) combine encashed this to its advantage. Today, it is almost as if people have reconciled to these problems and consider them a part of their everyday lives.
Except for the terror attack of 26/11 – that could affect 12 urban Lok Sabha constituencies out of 48 from the state in the Lok Sabha – it is mathematical equations of polling percentages that dominate 2009 elections, not issues.
The BJP-SS alliance was formed in 1990. Since then, two things have happened: the Congress (and later the Congress-NCP combine) has had a vote share of around 40 per cent; and the difference between a winner or loser has been just two to three per cent of the vote share.
| Total seats: 48 |
| Congress: 13 |
| Shiv Sena: 12 |
| BJP: 12 |
| NCP: 10 |
| RPI: 1 |
Although NCP and SS had managed to stitch the alliance with their respective partners, there is suspicion among their allies that these parties will help each other in the constituencies where they are not involved in a direct fight with each other. Out of 22 constituencies contested by Sena and NCP each, in nine constituencies, they are not fighting against each other.
An SS leader admitted off the record that it might be difficult for Sena to campaign aggressively for the BJP candidate in the Mumbai North-East seat. The BJP’s candidate is former MP Kirit Somaiya who is Gujarati; but NCP’s candidate is local MLA Sanjay Patil, who is exploiting the Marathi manoos theme to the hilt, a slogan SS has claimed as its own.
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Similarly NCP president Sharad Pawar’s last minute decision to shift from Shirur in Pune district to Madha in Solapur district is considered to be part of a larger understanding between Sena and NCP. By shifting from the constituency Pawar has made it easy for Sena candidate and seating MP Shivajirao Adhalrao-Patil to retain Shirur. Incidentally, there is an NCP-BJP-Sena alliance in Pune local bodies.
Recently in an interview with Business Standard senior Sena leader Sanjay Raut did not deny the possibility of walking out of the BJP embrace to support Sharad Pawar if he is in the fray for the Primeministership. He only said: “we would like to see BJP’s Primeministerial candidate L K Advani become Prime Minister”.
Noted political analyst Kumar Ketkar said: “In Maharashtra, treachery is the other name of alliance politics. In West Bengal and Kerala there is a Left front but we have never heard or seen the CPM trying to defeat candidates of Front partners like the RSP or Forward Block”.
Under the circumstances, alliance politics is central to the Maharashtra outcome.