Following Nationalist Congress Party chief and Union agriculture minister Sharad Pawar’s opposition to the separate Vidarbha, pro-Vidarbha leaders have accused him of backstabbing. Jambuwantrao Dhote, who led the first major public agitation in 1971 for the demand of separate Vidarbha, has said that the NCP chief has made baseless statements regarding the demand.
Mr Dhote said, “Last month the NCP decided in its meeting held in Delhi to supports separate Vidarbha and made a public announcement of the decision. Mr Pawar was also present in that meeting. But he changed his stand after coming to Maharashtra. It has been Mr Pawar’s reputation that whenever he firmly says no, next day he says yes to the same thing. He can be a subject of research.”
While his party has expressed support for statehood to Vidarbha, Mr Pawar, in an interview published in NCP in-house magazine Rashtrawadi, discarded the claims that the people of Vidarbha want a separate state.
He said that while his party might have declared any stand with respect to the demand for a separate Vidarbha, he was opposed to the idea.
Pro-Vidarbha leader was particularly upset about Mr Pawar’s claim that the local people of the region have never been in support of a separate state.
He has said that during the formation of the state, Vidarbha became part of the state, but the Hindi-speaking people who have migrated from the Madhya Pradesh, have always held a grudge and only these people are demanding a separate state.
However, Mr Dhote announced that he is ready to give up the demand if less than 95 per cent population of the region is not in favour of the separate statehood. He challenged that the Central government should hold plebiscite on the issue.
“The Central government should also accept this challenge. Not just a simple majority, but we will give up on the demand if less than 95 per cent of the population votes in the favour of separate Vidarbha. I had won a Lok Sabha election only on this issue and so had Ram Hedau. Several other leaders have also fought and won elections on this issue,” Mr Dhote said.