'Ajit Pawar's NCP behind BJP's poor show': RSS magazine on Maha LS polls

The magazine said that the BJP's decades-old partnership with the Shiv Sena and its latest faction was 'Hindutva based' and thus 'natural' but that was not the case with the NCP

A Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)-linked weekly magazine, in its latest issue, blamed the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s alliance with the Ajit Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) for the party’s poor performance in the Lok Sabha elections in Maharashtra.

“Every (BJP) worker, while narrating the unease and reasons for failure in the polls (in Maharashtra), starts with the alliance with the NCP,” latest issue of Marathi weekly magazine ‘Vivek’ said in its cover story, adding that it is evident that the BJP workers did not like the coalition.

Why did the BJP-Sena alliance work but NCP coalition failed?

The magazine further said that even the BJP leadership is aware of this development. It noted that the BJP’s decades-old partnership with the Shiv Sena and its latest faction was ‘Hindutva based’ and thus ‘natural’. 

The BJP had joined hands with the Eknath Shinde-Sena to form the government in Maharashtra, toppling the Uddhav Thackeray government in June 2022. In July last year, the Pawar-led NCP faction joined hands with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance government, in which Pawar got the post of deputy chief minister.

The magazine said that in Maharashtra, the government, party workers and those with similar ideologies had no coordination among them, which could be “dangerous for the future.”

How many seats BJP get in Lok Sabha polls in Maharashtra?

In Maharashtra, the BJP contested the Lok Sabha elections with its two allies on all 48 seats. Of the 28 seats that the BJP itself contested, it won only nine. Last time, it won 23 seats. The Shinde camp contested 15 seats and emerged victorious in 7, while the NCP contested four seats but managed to secure only 1 seat.

The results were announced on June 4.

Setback for Ajit Pawar, four leaders switch to Sharad Pawar’s NCP

Notably, earlier today four top leaders of the Ajit Pawar’s group resigned and joined the Sharad Pawar camp at the senior leader’s residence in Pune. Sharad Pawar, who is among the founders of the NCP, had joined hands with the Congress-led INDIA bloc ahead of the Lok Sabha polls.

Notably, after the BJP failed to secure a majority in the Lok Sabha on its own in this year’s polls, Organiser, another RSS-affiliated magazine, had noted that the party was in a ‘bubble’ and the poll result served as a ‘reality check’ for it.