By Md. Ali, TwoCircles.net,
Patna: Something new and positive is happening in Maharashtra. Frustrated by the non-performance of the Maharashtra government when it comes to Muslim issues, Muslim politicians of ruling Congress and NCP have started to resign from their elected positions.
There has been a strong sense of resentment against the Maharashtra government among the Muslims because of its policy of pathetic indifference towards issues related to the community in the state, prominently its complete failure to protect minorities in the state against the frequent riots in Digris, Dhulia, Pusad, Yawatmal, arrest of innocent youths in various blasts and so on.
The anger was manifested in the en masse resignation of the members of the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) particularly among the lower wrung of the political and official hierarchy.
For instance more than 40 corporaters from Congress and NCP had resigned and if one includes the people from Gram Panchayats and Panchayat Samitis then the number of those who had resigned goes beyond 300.
This phenomenon had started around one and half month ago.
In order to know what happened to this ‘movement’ TwoCircles.net talked to many stake holders and tried to know about the current situation.
TwoCircles.net talked on this issue to Shahid Lateef, the editor of Mumbai based Inquilab and an acute observer of the political scenario in Maharashtra. He pointed out that as far as the resignation of party members and corporaters from the Congress and NCP is concerned it has stopped now.
The reason why the resignations could not make huge impact was that the people who resigned were not honest. Suspecting the motives of people who had resigned from their posts he pointed out that their move was “a part of strategy and was politically motivated.”
The people resigned out of public pressure. And that is why he noticed that they submitted their resignation to their respective party presidents and what he calls “aalakamaan” the party bosses in a hope that if they will submit their resignations to the party bosses then there will be scope for its withdrawal.
But didn’t the resignations make impact?
Indeed it created ripples in the political ponds he conceded. It made the ruling parties feel threatened because for the first time they felt as if the government can no longer take them for granted.
This was the first time that they were encountering such kinds of steps taken by their party members. So they felt it necessary to do the damage control.
RR Patil met the angry corporaters and party members and went out of his way to assure them that their concerns will be taken care of. They assured and convinced them thereby managed to persuade them to withdraw their resignations.
Other big wigs of Maharashtra like Sharad Pawar also said some thing favorable to the Muslims with the aim to placate them.
He said some favorable statements and that was all needed to contain the effects of resignations.
The reason was the dishonesty of the people who put in their papers not because of their personal commitment to the community instead because of the political and public pressure.
And there was also the reason that the resignations were not the part of some well chalked out strategy by the political leaders who were angry against the present policy of the government.
But there were some people who resigned out of their commitment towards their community. One of them was Maqbool Saleem who had resigned from the post of corporater of Nanded Municipal Corporation and also from that of district president of NCP.
And more importantly he submitted his resignation to the municipal commissioner instead of the NCP president with the hope that that he will be withdrawing his resignation, which was accepted by the commissioner.
Talking to TwoCircles.net Mr. Saleem agreed to all which is mentioned above.
“But the fact of the matter is”, he pointed out, “that resentment is still there; rather it has increased to in fold the larger masses.”
According to him that anti Congress and anti- NCP wave has taken other different forms.
For instance the angry individuals are now coming to be united on one platform and channelise that anger positively and constructively in the direction of exploring a viable political alternative in the state.
“We thought that instead of criticizing the NCP and the Congress we should concentrate on our plan that what has to be done in this scenario. So we are trying to chalk out our strategy.”
For the purpose the secular intellectuals and political activists are having meetings in many places like Yawatmal, Pusad and many other places.
Nothing has been decided yet and still meetings are being organized in an effort to know all the views and be united on one front and this will take some time argued Mr. Saleem.
By organizing meetings across the state the effort is to bring together and unite all the secular forces and those who are non- Congress, non- NCP Non- Shiva Sena and anti-MNS.
In these meetings many views and opinions are coming up, some are saying to form a political party but some are saying to exercise restraint and caution while taking any step.
TCN informed him about the plans of Assam United Democratic Front (AUDF) the Assam based party to launch itself in Maharashtra and fight general elections in the state.
Maqbool Saleem said that he is looking forward to the November 30, meeting called by the AUDF and some eminent and concerned citizens of Mumbai to discuss the issue of exploring political alternative.
And then there are some who think recent arrests of Hindutva leaders in terrorism cases is a result of growing Muslim anger in Maharashtra.
As a Malegaon journalist Mubasshir Mushtaq notes that “initially ATS suspected that SIMI was the behind the Malegaon blast. The ATS knew it from the day one that the killer motorcycle belonged to Sadhvi but yet they continued their combing operations in Muslim areas of Malegaon!”
The ATS logically followed up on the clues only after the government felt the heat of Muslim anger in the form of avalanche of resignations.