Mumbai: BJP has not offered Rajya Sabha seat to Narayan Rane

Mumbai: Former Maharashtra chief minister Narayan Rane has been claiming that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) apparently offered him a Rajya Sabha (RS) seat. A BJP insider called it ‘lollipop of Holi,’ which clearly indicated that the former Congress leader won’t be the NDA candidate for RS poll due on March 23. On the other hand, two surprise names include Vishwas Pathak and Mukul Kanitkar from Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) are the names doing rounds in the BJP circles of the capital.

These seats will be vacant in April 2 and the outgoing members including Ajaykumar Sancheti of BJP, Anil Desai of Shiv Sena, Rajeev Shukla and Rajani Patil of Congress and Vandana Chavan and D P Tripathi from Nationalist Congress Party. Sena and NCP have decided to extend one more term to Desai and Chavan, respectively.

The BJP insider further stated, the party will not extend the term for Sancheti, for his alleged involvement in Gosekhurd irrigation project. Instead, Prakash Javadekar, union minister for Human Resource Development will be given the ticket from the Maharashtra quota. “Javadewar was elected from Madhya Pradesh quota in 2014, to accomodate Ramdas Athawale, leader of Republican Party of India,” he insider said.

The leader claimed that the names of Vijaya Rahatkar, the chairperson of Maharashtra state commission for women and Shaina N C were doing the rounds but hadn’t been short-listed by the party. “Rahatkar is on constitutional post and no need to send her at RS and Shaina has come under scanner in the Nirav Modi scam,” claimed the party source.

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Vishwas Pathak, former managing director of Nagpur Tarun Bharat, and a close associate of Nitin Gadkari has been recommended by the RSS. At present he is the director of Maharashtra State Electricity Board holding company. RSS has also recommended Mukul Kanitkar, member of a school board and staunch supporter of ‘Gurukul’ – ancient Indian teaching system.

The source said, Narayan Rane himself has been spreading news of being offered a ticket to contest RS poll as the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) candidate. “Just play holi and take ‘goli’ (lollipop),” the leader commented on speculation on Rane getting a ticket.

Former union minister Milind Deora, close to Rahul Gandhi, president of Congress is likely to get a ticket. Former union minister Sushilkumar Shinde and former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan too are lobbying, but the Congress high command will give them candidature for state assembly elections.