Mumbai, December 19: The state Congress seems to be confronted with challenges within the organisation.
Senior party MP and former Union minister Vilas Muttemwar recently wrote to prime minister Manmohan Singh justifying the demand for statehood for the Vidarbha region. The other Congress MPs and MLAs of the region have also voiced their support for the statehood demand.
“As the elected MP from Nagpur, it is my duty to convey the correct picture of the region to the prime minister,” said Muttemwar.
However, chief minister Ashok Chavan retorted, “The statehood demand for Vidarbha is not acceptable.”
The united Republican Party of India, which has a sizeable presence among the Dalit masses, has decided to make it an electoral plank.
The BJP has in principle always advocated the separate statehood status even as it alliance partner Shiv Sena is opposed to bifurcation of state. The MNS chief Raj Thackeray’s opposition to the demand has brought the issue to the centre stage.
Unfortunately, Muttemwar finds little support on the issue within the Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee. Majority of the elected members from Marathwada, Konkan, Western Maharashtra and North Maharashtra are not keen on a division of the state.
The cotton-growing region of Vidarbha has recorded the maximum farmer suicides in the past five years. The region accounts for 60 MLAs in a house of 288 MLAs of the state assembly. It represents ten MPs (across all parties) in the Lok Sabha.
The economic survey of the state government (2007-08) released in March 2009 clearly ranks Vidarbha lower in the category of per capital income. The highest is greater Mumbai (Rs60,375), Pune (Rs60,375), Thane (Rs58,224), Raigad (Rs47,648), Nashik (Rs46,064), and Nagpur [capital of Vidarbha] (Rs44,589). Incidentally, the lowest per capital income status is also accorded to Washim (Vidarbha) at Rs20,774.
–Agencies–