The 'Ghashiram Kotwal' tale!

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Late author Vijay Tendulkar's play Ghashiram Kotwal many think is a masterpiece. It is the political version of the Frankenstein's monster story which we see unfolding repeatedly in various parts of the world. Whether it is the story of Khalistani militant leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, LTTE's Prabhakaran or Osama bin Laden, they are all versions of Tendulkar's Ghashiram Kotwal. The reason one is reminded of this story is because just on the eve of Parliament elections in Maharashtra, the drama Ghashiram is yet again being played in the political theatre and this time we really don't know if the end will be similar to Tendulkar's script or something completely different!

As Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar sits down to draw the blueprint of his party's campaign strategy for the elections, this time in Maharashtra he has to face two "Ghashiram Kotwals". The first one is a political party that the Congress itself encouraged and cultivated since the late 1960s to keep the leftists in Mumbai at bay, "Shiv Sena", and the second one is an organisation "Shiv Sangram" that has been recently floated by a former NCP member Vinayak Mete who was once close to Pawar!

Just the way Shiv Sena was groomed by the then chief minister Vasantrao Naik in 1960s to challenge the growing clout of Leftists in Mumbai's textile mills, small politically-motivated groups like Shiv Sangram were cultivated by Sharad Pawar's NCP in Maharashtra to counter the BJP in the last few years. Now the leaders of these groups have become too big for NCP or Congress' comfort and have started politically challenging their very own mentors in a serious manner !

A major political issue in rural areas of Maharashtra that is likely to grow big in the run-up to the elections is the demand of 'reservation for Maratha (not Marathi) community'. The issue is being very vigorously taken up by politically-motivated groups like Shiv Sangram and frankly speaking, the Congress-NCP government in Maharashtra seems to be caught off-guard. The government does not know how to react to the sudden aggression of these groups which seems to be getting large support in rural areas. Just a week ago, when Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan visited the Shivneri fort on Chhatrapati Shivaji's birth anniversary, his helicopter was stone-pelted by pro-Maratha reservation activists. Maharashtra has seen many agitations in the last few decades but never this kind of aggression. The government simply does not know how to react to this. The Bapat Commission appointed by the government to look into the demand of reservation for Maratha community recommended against providing this reservation but politically this is a very uncomfortable situation for the Congress and NCP.

Most of the top political leaders from Maharashtra such as Sharad Pawar, Vilasrao Deshmukh, Ashok Chavan etc belong to the Maratha community. This community also has strong representation in the judiciary, the police force and state bureaucracy but some leaders like Vinayak Mete feel that most members of Maratha community (which constitutes over 50 per cent population) have not got a fair share in development and economic growth, hence they need reservation. The other large community, which is the OBCs, are very apprehensive about this as they feel that Marathas will take away some share of their reservation quota. Political leaders, who belong to OBC communities, like Chhagan Bhujbal and Gopinath Munde have openly stated that they will not allow any cut in present OBC reservation quota.

While the Maratha reservation issue seems to be slowly capturing the mind space of most rural voters, other issues such as power shortage and farmers' suicides seems to be taking the back seat. Parties like Shiv Sangram are pushing it hard and the original mentors of these parties like Mr Pawar seem to have no control over this. Truly a Ghashiram Kotwal kind of a situation...the Congress-NCP government does not have any solutions for other long-pending issues either. In most villages in Maharashtra there is no electricity for 14 hours every day while in small towns

(district places) there is no power for six hours every day and since Pranab Mukherjee's Budget announcement for farmers, in the last one week itself, about 11 farmers have committed suicide in Maharashtra's Vidarbha region.

Political parties are still gauging and guessing the mood of the public and are yet to launch their campaigns in the rural areas in full swing but some of the issues are expected to take centrestage once the campaign heats up. It remains to be seen how the parties in power will deal with the situation and with the new age Ghashirams!