“Amit Shah is going to take away the Shinde Sena's coterie. Make a note of it. He had tried to remove us, but we managed to escape it. The Shinde Sena’s coterie will be eliminated from Delhi. This is Shah’s character and methods of operation,” Mr. Raut added.
Mumbai: Senior Shiv Sena UBT leader Sanjay Raut has targeted the BJP saying the saffron party will soon split the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena. Union home minister Amit Shah is going to take away the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena’s coterie, he alleged. Former Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole also claimed that the BJP has started “operation Lotus” against its alliance partner.
“BJP leader Amit Shah will be the one to destroy them (Mr. Shinde’s party)... at least 35 MLAs will split,” said Mr. Raut. “To take out Shinde, they will conduct a similar operation as they did with the undivided Shiv Sena. The BJP appointed Ravindra Chavan from Dombivli, the state president, for the same reason. He knows politics. The BJP has a record of backstabbing; they did it with Bal Thackeray.”
“Amit Shah is going to take away the Shinde Sena's coterie. Make a note of it. He had tried to remove us, but we managed to escape it. The Shinde Sena’s coterie will be eliminated from Delhi. This is Shah’s character and methods of operation,” Mr. Raut added.
The Rajya Sabha MP also criticised the BJP accusing it of destroying the culture and fabric of Maharashtra’s elections, making them money-oriented.
“In the last five years, under the leadership of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, crores of rupees have been spent on elections, which has disrupted the culture of elections. The State CM and the government never got involved at the grassroots level of elections,” he said.
Mr. Raut slammed the deputy CM for speaking openly about giving money in local body polls and he urged the state election commission to take cognisance of the statement made by Mr. Shinde. “Mr. Shinde and his gang have said that Lakshmi Darshan will be held for local body elections. The Election Commission should now investigate how many people have taken this Lakshmi’s darshan. Such high financial stakes were never seen before in the municipal and local body elections,” alleged Mr. Raut.
The Shiv Sena (UBT) leader accused the MahaYuti parties of wielding money power. “The local body elections have always been contested on the merit and hard work of every party’s workers. The government and top leaders were never involved. This time, elections are being contested using five or six helicopters and private planes. The three ruling parties, namely BJP, Eknath Shinde Sena and Ajit Pawar NCP, are spending hundreds of crores of rupees. For whom are they fighting?” questioned Mr. Raut.
Mr. Patole also claimed that BJP will eventually break Eknath Shinde’s and Ajit Pawar’s parties. “The BJP has launched ‘Operation Lotus’ to induct MLAs from the Shiv Sena. And if the time comes, even some of Ajit Pawar’s MLAs will be brought into the BJP. Their state president Ravindra Chavan has given a clear indication of it. The BJP will now not rest until it takes people from the Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP),” the Congress leader said.
