maharashtra : Sharad Pawar courting Urban Naxals

Then came another shock from the once political stalwart Sharad Pawar, the Maratha strongman, who openly supported the Bhima Koregaon rallies and gave statements directly instigating castes to fight each other on streets. His men were caught in the acts of rioting at many places.

Political Alienation
In recent times, Sharad Pawar, once a stalwart in Maharashtra politics is being continuously marginalised politically. His party is losing ground. He is also facing unrest within the party for his support to his daughter, Supriya,  over nephew Ajit Pawar. Many of his MLAs are unhappy over his policies.

Moreover, Pawar, himself, has lost public support even in their traditional bastions like western Maharashtra”s sugar belt. The public perception has grown over the time and he has lost the trust of the youngsters.
His marginalisation speeded up, after Modi came to the political centre stage. Developmental politics of Modi and Fadanvis gave him last push and the NCP lost heavily in local body elections recently.
Sharad Pawar has repeatedly shown his casteist mindset when he pointed to the Fadanvis” caste mentioning him as Peshawa. He even opposed the “Maharashtra Bhushan” award declared for senior Shiv Shahir Babasaheb Purandare, mentioning his caste.

In the recent decade, there was an effort to create a separate “religion” named “Shiv Dharm” in Maharashtra and bordering districts of Karnataka, carving it out from Marathas. New religious rituals were formed and Marathas were made to follow, denying Hindu gods and Vedic rituals. There are strong pieces of evidence to show that these efforts to harm Hindu society were fully supported and funded by Sharad Pawar.
Even he is blamed for his support to Sambhaji Brigade, which challenged everything Hindu about Chhatrapati Shivaji Mahara.

Two years ago, he had called a meeting of few leftists posing as historians in Mumbai’s Yashavant Rao Chavan Centre and batted for re-writing of the history to suit his political goals and which can be used to challenge the Modi Government. But the project had to be slowed down as the news was broken by The Organiser and the Tarun Bharat daily. In that meeting, he had said that there is nothing Hindu in the history that should be tought to the students and everything should be plain secular.

Open Tilt to Ultra-Left
Just two month ago in Nagpur, addressing a joint rally of Congress-NCP against the govt of Maharashtra, Sharad  Pawar had shockingly called on the public not to pay government taxes and not to pay govt and bank dues. Denying state taxes is an openly Naxal stand. This came as a shock not only to journalists covering the rally but even to NCP and Congress leaders. Prithviraj Chavan, ex-CM was heard saying that Pawar is playing into the hands of his old age. NCP leaders avoided supporting Pawar’s shocking statement.

But this was just a part of the iceberg of Pawar”s revival plan by creating ultra left disturbances in the society.
Around three weeks later, came Bhima Koregaon Elgar Parishad, the open participation of leftists in it and the disturbances that followed. Sharad Pawar was blunt in making hard-hitting casteist statements and supporting the ultra-left groups. The police even suspect the funding for Bhima-Koregaon disturbances coming from him. Some of his men were arrested recently.

The urban Naxal penetration was way beyond their imagination, said a prominent NCP MLA.  And the latest in the series came the Jan 26 rally for “Save Constitution”. The rally which was presented as united opposition effort had a peculiar Left stamp over it. The brain behind it was suspected to be none other than Sharad Pawar. The entire
Left, including Jignesh Mevani, Kanhaiyya Kumar, Umar Khalid (all three were charged with instigating Bhima Koregaon violence), Yetchuri, Karat etc. The speeches were stamped with left leanings.

Danger to the Society
This is a democracy. Every man and the party has his/its right to politically survive. But it should not be at the cost of the society and nation, many feel. What senior Pawar is doing, is giving legitimacy to the ultra-Left fringes and urban Naxals who are ready to create anarchy in the society.

Indian society by its born wisdom has kept these elements marginalised till date. Pawar for his political gains is making them politically stronger which will destroy the social fabric forever, some internal security experts believe. Once powerful, these left-naxal elements would not be easy to eliminate and they will generate situations suitable for the civil war, which is their dream for breaking India.

They are currently using all the restive issues within the society—the agrarian crisis, the digital India divide, the ruthless public administration of long-running congressculture, the corruption prevailing in the same administration, the police inhumanness at some places, social issues like unemployment, rising commodity prices etc. The fringes are adding to the unrest thru casteist divide, making castes fight each other on irrelevant issues.

Disruptive Agenda
This Ultra Left Rise in many states is a concern for internal security experts. They suggest multipronged approach—police, political, counselling, awareness drive etc.

But the major concern is openly political and suspected financial support by the political stalwart like Pawar to these ultra-Left elements. The difference between Congress and Pawar is, Congress deliberately used Left intellectuals to counter Hindutva narrative. But Pawar lacks that intellectual prowess to control the Left intellectuals. Plus he is directly using Ultra Left (which Congress kept marginalised), to instigate social unrest that he himself may not control.

The Nationalist forces from every party and every walk of life, every organisation should oppose the radical ultra leftisation of the politics an society.
The Sangh Parivar and BJP should lead a strong campaign against this ultra-left effort to break India from within.  Sharad Pawar should be politically marginalised once and for all to keep Hindu India safe. The leaders from within the NCP should keep the party from going to the hands of Naxals.

Despite his efforts to break Indian social fabric, the youth will never follow his casteist narrative ever and the days of divide and rule are over. The Indian youth now wants the development at par with the world and is not interested in the divisive politics.
The pace and maturity with which the Bhima Koregaon disturbances were controlled from within the society prove the intentions of the youth of new Hindu India. The message of the youth is clear enough, ‘back off or get crushed beneath the developmental juggernaut’.