Maharashtra chief minister Prathviraj Chavan wants to have complete control over the organisation. He is said to be lobbying for his “man” to head the PCC ahead of the crucial local body elections, including the crucial Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation next year. This could be his first political test as a leader of the state.
Mr Chavan is perhaps the first chief minister of the Congress sent to Mumbai from New Delhi with the full backing of the party high command (Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, party chief Sonia Gandhi and Mr Pranab Mukherjee). Earlier, Mr A.R. Antulay too was sent to Maharashtra from New Delhi by the late Sanjay Gandhi and Indira Gandhi but he had enough experience of working in the state as a legislator and minister. Mr Chavan had no such experience as he had started his political career as a member of Parliament from 1991. According to Congress sources, the CM is lobbying for Mr Rohidas Patil to become a PCC chief. He is not comfortable with incumbent state Congress president Manikrao Thakre with the latter becoming controversial in a land scam. Besides, Mr Thakre is known to be loyal to the “power”. Mr Vilasrao Deshmukh made him the PCC chief but he had switched over to Mr Ashok Chavan within no time after the latter become chief minister.
The Congress high command hardly gives a free hand to its chief ministers in the organisational matters with a strategy to make a balance in the party. If a CM belongs to one faction, then a PCC chief should be from the other camp. The late Rajiv Gandhi had made Prabha Rau a PCC chief without taking into confidence the then chief minister Vasantdada Patil. Vasantdada had quit the chief ministership in protest against the high command.
Congress chief Sonia Gandhi too did not give Mr Deshmukh a free hand in the organisation during his tenure as chief minister. She had appointed heavyweights like Mr Govindrao Adik and Prabha Rau as PCC chiefs.
Mr Rohidas Patil, a former Maharashtra minister, lost the state Assembly poll because of the intra-party rivalries. He was alleged to have worked against the Congress candidate in the Lok Sabha elections and the detractors ganged up to defeat him in the Assembly elections.