Maharashtra State elections have thrown up surprising results, results that have defied all opinion polls and even surprised the winning candidates. Normally, when politicians win, there is wild celebration, this time the celebrations were all but missing.
BJP won 132 seats out 149 that it contested. Eknath Shinde’s break away Shiv Sena won 57 seats out 81 that it contested and the big surprise was Ajit Pawar’s NCP that won 41 out of 59 that it contested. The opinion polls had given Ajit Pawar not more than 13 seats and some had predicted single digit seats for his party.
The government formation was to take place by 26th November but got delayed as the constituents of MahaYuti (BJP-Shinde Sena-Ajit NCP) bickered about ministries and decision on who will become the CM.
Finally, everything was resolved and Devendra Fadnavis took oath as CM, while Eknath Shinde had to take oath as Deputy CM (a climb down for him) and Ajit Pawar was more than happy to become the Deputy CM again.
The swearing in ceremony, attended by who’s-who of Maharashtra, was held on 5th December at Azad Maidain and graced by top leadership of BJP, including Modi and Shah.
While this was expected after the surprising results, what came the next day was a bigger surprise.
Before the 2024 Lok Sabha Elections and before Ajit Pawar had switched sides and joined the BJP’s Government in Maharashtra, the Income Tax Department had seized property worth 1,000 Crores belonging, as claimed by IT Department, to Ajit Pawar.
The case dragged on while Ajit Pawar was the Deputy CM and the case was still standing when the state assembly elections took place.
Narendra Modi had publicly spoken about this taint and called the NCP as ‘Naturally Corrupt Party’. He had also said that Ajit Pawar was involved in 70,000 Crore irrigation scam.
Devendra Fadnavis had sworn that he would never ally with NCP and that he would stay out of power if it meant joining hands with NCP. He also said that Ajit Pawar would go to jail and chakki peesing and peesing and peesing, in a dramatic press conference.
When Ajit Pawar joined the Maharashtra Government, a decision that was triggered by the fear of Eknath Shinde getting disqualified, all talks of corruption of Ajit Pawar stopped.
Now that Ajit Pawar has become the Deputy CM in the new government, the Income Tax department case of seizure of this alleged property has been withdrawn. This happened on the day after his being sworn in as the Deputy CM of Maharashtra.
The Income Tax Department had called these as ‘benami’ properties of Ajit Pawar, his wife and son.
When a property is ‘benami’, it means, it is held by a dummy, while the real owner is someone else. By restoring the property, all media channels talked about how Ajit Pawar had been restored ownership of the seized properties!
That is a paradox, when the properties were never claimed by Ajit Pawar, how can release of property be his gain?
What this incident demonstrates is that the Modi Government is in-your-face. It will prosecute you and persecute you until you bow to them, and if you bow to them, the rewards are instantaneous. The Modi Government has such faith in its media management that it can do anything that is brazen and get away with it.
It will claim that it was the courts that allowed the restoration of properties as it has the habit of hiding behind the judiciary and court decisions. It will gloss over the fact that PM Modi lied about Ajit Pawar while the case was in the court and called Ajit Pawar corrupt, violating the dictum, innocent until proven guilty. Modi has the penchant of throwing wild accusations while cases are in the court and given that he has the entire media at his disposal, he gets away with tarnishing the image of any one he targets.
We have come to a cross road in politics. The blatant restoration of properties of an accused in 70,000 Crore scam, to the tune of 1,000 Crores demonstrates that the current government will reward anyone who is corrupt as long as they are their partners, that corruption is all right as long as it is done under their patronage, that if you are willing, they are more than willing to cover up for you. This bodes ill for the country. The Pawarification of Indian Politics is going to encourage politicians to loot and plunder as they know that there is an escape hatch available, should they get caught.
