Congress leaders from Vidarbha are threatening to quit the party if the high command does not consider their demand of a separate state along with Telangana.
According to a section of Congress MPs, the demand for a separate Vidarbha state will certainly be an issue in the coming Lok Sabha and Maharashtra Assembly polls.
“The Congress will be a loser in the polls if it adopts dilly-dallying tactics,” they feared and said the Congress can win only one of the total 10 seats in the region if the Lok Sabha elections are held today.
Vidarbha was once the stronghold of the Congress whose leaders in the region were known for their loyalty to the Gandhi-Nehru family. Now, it has just four Lok Sabha members, Vilas Muttemwar (Nagpur), Mukul Wasnik (Ramtek), Datta Meghe (Wardha) and Marotrao Kowase (Gadchiroli-Chimur). Union minister and the NCP leader Praful Patel won from the Bhandara-Gondiya seat.
The rest five Lok Sabha seats, Amravati, Buldhana, Yavatmal-Washim (all Shiv Sena) and Chandrapur, Akola (BJP), were won by the non-Congress parties.
While the two national parties — the Congress and the BJP — are competing with each other to gain political mileage on this issue, the Sharad Pawar-led NCP is not opposing the demand.
Some Maharashtra ministers from Vidarbha are floating the idea to launch “apolitical” movement for the separate state under the leadership of Dr Vikas Amte, the son of noted social activist late Baba Amte. This will help making it a mass movement and thereby compel the Congress leadership to create Vidarbha alongwih Telangana state, they viewed. Maharashtra chief minister Prathviraj Chavan (western Maharashtra) and PCC chief Manikrao Thakre (Vidarbha) have yet to take a clear stand on this issue.