Shiv Sena takes dig at BJP over local body polls

Despite being alliance partners, Shiv Sena on Wednesday took potshots at BJP, a day after the latter was trounced in the crucial Nagar Panchayat and Zilla Parishad polls.

BJP’s fight for existence in the local bodies indicated that people were not benefiting from their governance, the Sena said in its editorial in the party mouthpiece Saamana.

“Expecting that people’s sentiments can be bought with power and money, is wrong. BJP’s defeat is painful for us as it is an old ally. We never expected that the winds of change would start blowing so soon,” the Sena said.

The editorial has been written in the backdrop of local body polls in which BJP won five seats while Congress got 21 seats and the Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) bagged 20 seats each in the election to the six Nagar Panchayats in Maharashtra.

This was the second phase of election for 102 seats after the first round of 345 seats in 19 Nagar Panchayats held in January this year.

The state government had formed 138 new Nagar Panchayats in 2014 by bifurcating urban areas at taluka headquarters.

The editorial said BJP ministers were in the habit of making new announcements everyday that have no substance in them.

It is surprising that Congress which has no leadership in the state, and the NCP — riddled with corruption charges — could manage to secure decent gains in the recently held polls, the Sena read.

“Now there will be clarifications (from BJP) that the results of local polls do not reflect the sentiments of people in the state. But there is no point in playing hide and seek,” it said.

“Since the party has come to power at the Centre, it is expected that right from Gram Panchayat to Lok Sabha, people are in favour of BJP,” the party further added.

Observing that “rising waves eventually settle down and the force of blowing air” decreases with time, the Sena further mocked that the “dust too settles down eventually”.

“If the BJP has to fight for its survival, it should take into account the fact that the fruits of governance are not reaching the people and that loot is happening,” the party said.