Won't be surprised if Cong decides to go solo in Maharashtra civic polls: Prithviraj Chavan

Mumbai, Jul 9 (PTI) Former Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan has said he would not be surprised if the Congress decides to go solo in Mumbai and other civic body polls in the state likely to be held later this year.

In an interview with PTI Videos, Chavan also targeted the Devendra Fadnavis government over law and order in the state following some incidents of workers of the Raj Thackeray-led MNS assaulting people for not speaking in Marathi.

To a question, he said, "Congress party's stand is that our alliance is with our INDIA alliance partners - which is the Shiv Sena (UBT) and NCP (SP). If they want to do a sub alliance with some other party, like-minded party, that's their business." "But if they want to make an alliance with people who are fundamentally opposed to the Congress ideology, ideology of secularism, ideology of what Ambedkar wrote in the Constitution, then we will not accept that," he added.

Chavan said when they a meeting in Delhi recently of the Congress over the local body elections in Mumbai and other places, they placed their views before a committee, which will take a stand on whether they will go in for an alliance with the INDIA bloc members or contest separately.

"In the past also, although we had alliance for the Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha (polls), we fought the local body election separately, and I wouldn't be surprised if the Congress party body (committee) decides to go for Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur elections separately," he said.

On Tuesday, workers of the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) and other groups led a protest march in Mira Bhayander area of Thane near Mumbai to defend the Marathi 'asmita' (pride) amid rising political heat following the attack on a shopkeeper for refusal to speak in Marathi.

Asked about the protest, Chavan claimed, “One thing is very clear, it is the central government's policy, insisted by RSS, they want one nation-one language, one nation-one religion, one nation-one election. This mindset comes from 1930s Germany, Hitler's Germany." And they are still trying to "impose this business," he said.

Now, why people of Maharashtra rose against the central government's policy, it’s because of imposition of Hindi language from Class 1 (in schools), he said.

"We are not against Hindi language, we’re against the imposition from Class 1. You started after Class 5, Class 6 as well. Initially, you cannot burden a child of six years, with three different languages. There are not enough teachers, there are not enough textbooks, and that will only dilute the command over English or the mother tongue," he said.

So, the entire population of Maharashtra, in one voice, protested against this imposition of Hindi, the Congress leader said.

And finally, the chief minister and the state government realised that whatever the central government may want, it will be difficult to implement the imposition of Hindi from Class one in Maharashtra, so they took a backseat and the policy was scrapped, he said.

"The matter is over," he added.

Now, some people want to celebrate and get political mileage out of it, they are welcome to do it, he said, referring to a joint rally recently held by Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray and his cousin Raj Thackeray after the government withdraw the orders (GRs) on the introduction of Hindi in primary classes.

"If Shiv Sena, two brothers come together to fight BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) election, that's welcome," Chavan said.

To a question on the Mira Bhayander incident, Chavan said he can't understand why the protest is continuing.

"The government of Maharashtra has taken back the GR, has accepted what people of Maharashtra wanted, has accepted what Shivsena and MNS wanted," he said.

They want to celebrate, let them celebrate, the celebration is over now, but you cannot take law and order in your hands, he said.

"You cannot start beating up people who are not Marathi. And then the issue that they can't speak Marathi or nothing, No, it cannot happen," Chavan said.

"So my request to the chief minister is, the image of Maharashtra state is going out as a very weak, indecisive government, multiple party government, nobody is listening to each other. Now we had a MLA or a minister of Shinde (Shiv Sena) group, defying the chief minister's orders. So all this is a message that all is not well in Maharashtra, which is a fact," he claimed.

Chavan further claimed CM Devendra Fadnavis was busy in saving his alliance and ministers were behaving whichever way they want.

"But we will not tolerate anyone taking law and order in their own hands. The CM must punish, whether it is the incident in Mira Bhayander, or at the national levels...a BJP MP has talked nonsense. Home Minister Amit Shah should take action against that MP, but he will not take it, because he's playing his agenda," Chavan claimed.

Notably, BJP's Jharkhand Lok Sabha member Nishikant Dubey had in a post on X said, "To those beating Hindi speakers in Mumbai, if you have the courage, try beating Urdu speakers in Maharashtra. Even a dog is a tiger in its own home. Decide for yourself who is the dog and who is the tiger." His "patak patak ke marenge" (will thrash you) remarks further fuelled the fire. PTI AG GK