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By:

Abhijit Mulye

21 August 2024 at 11:29:11 am

Shinde dilutes demand

Likely to be content with Deputy Mayor’s post in Mumbai Mumbai: In a decisive shift that redraws the power dynamics of Maharashtra’s urban politics, the standoff over the prestigious Mumbai Mayor’s post has ended with a strategic compromise. Following days of resort politics and intense backroom negotiations, the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena has reportedly diluted its demand for the top job in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), settling instead for the Deputy Mayor’s post. This...

Shinde dilutes demand

Likely to be content with Deputy Mayor’s post in Mumbai Mumbai: In a decisive shift that redraws the power dynamics of Maharashtra’s urban politics, the standoff over the prestigious Mumbai Mayor’s post has ended with a strategic compromise. Following days of resort politics and intense backroom negotiations, the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena has reportedly diluted its demand for the top job in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), settling instead for the Deputy Mayor’s post. This development, confirmed by high-ranking party insiders, follows the realization that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) effectively ceded its claims on the Kalyan-Dombivali Municipal Corporation (KDMC) to protect the alliance, facilitating a “Mumbai for BJP, Kalyan for Shinde” power-sharing formula. The compromise marks a complete role reversal between the BJP and the Shiv Sena. Both the political parties were in alliance with each other for over 25 years before 2017 civic polls. Back then the BJP used to get the post of Deputy Mayor while the Shiv Sena always enjoyed the mayor’s position. In 2017 a surging BJP (82 seats) had paused its aggression to support the undivided Shiv Sena (84 seats), preferring to be out of power in the Corporation to keep the saffron alliance intact. Today, the numbers dictate a different reality. In the recently concluded elections BJP emerged as the single largest party in Mumbai with 89 seats, while the Shinde faction secured 29. Although the Shinde faction acted as the “kingmaker”—pushing the alliance past the majority mark of 114—the sheer numerical gap made their claim to the mayor’s post untenable in the long run. KDMC Factor The catalyst for this truce lies 40 kilometers north of Mumbai in Kalyan-Dombivali, a region considered the impregnable fortress of Eknath Shinde and his son, MP Shrikant Shinde. While the BJP performed exceptionally well in KDMC, winning 50 seats compared to the Shinde faction’s 53, the lotter for the reservation of mayor’s post in KDMC turned the tables decisively in favor of Shiv Sena there. In the lottery, the KDMC mayor’ post went to be reserved for the Scheduled Tribe candidate. The BJP doesn’t have any such candidate among elected corporatros in KDMC. This cleared the way for Shiv Sena. Also, the Shiv Sena tied hands with the MNS in the corporation effectively weakening the Shiv Sena (UBT)’s alliance with them. Party insiders suggest that once it became clear the BJP would not pursue the KDMC Mayor’s chair—effectively acknowledging it as Shinde’s fiefdom—he agreed to scale down his demands in the capital. “We have practically no hope of installing a BJP Mayor in Kalyan-Dombivali without shattering the alliance locally,” a Mumbai BJP secretary admitted and added, “Letting the KDMC become Shinde’s home turf is the price for securing the Mumbai Mayor’s bungalow for a BJP corporator for the first time in history.” The formal elections for the Mayoral posts are scheduled for later this month. While the opposition Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA)—led by the Shiv Sena (UBT)—has vowed to field candidates, the arithmetic heavily favors the ruling alliance. For Eknath Shinde, accepting the Deputy Mayor’s post in Mumbai is a tactical retreat. It allows him to consolidate his power in the MMR belt (Thane and Kalyan) while remaining a partner in Mumbai’s governance. For the BJP, this is a crowning moment; after playing second fiddle in the BMC for decades, they are poised to finally install their own “First Citizen” of Mumbai.

Fatal Faith

Temple stampedes are not accidents but failures of planning, of governance and institutional memory. India has seen far too many of them. The recent temple stampede in Goa, where seven persons were crushed to death and more than 70 injured, joins a grim list of mega devotional celebrations that all too easily have turned into death traps.


A scuffle apparently broke out between groups of dhonds, the barefoot devotees of the goddess. A bamboo stick brushed an overhead electric wire, sparks flew and panic spread fever-like among the throng as tens of thousands of devotees surged along a narrow, steep incline towards the temple. The sacred annual jatra descended into carnage. It was entirely predictable and entirely avoidable given that the geography of Shirgaon’s Lairai Devi temple is well known: a narrow 400-metre stretch, steep and slippery, that serves as the main access route for over 1.5 lakh attendees.


The event draws pilgrims from Goa, Maharashtra, and Karnataka every year. Yet, there was no meaningful crowd control. Police claimed they had set up ropes to divide the dhonds and the general public. But video footage and eyewitness accounts reveal what those in power prefer to ignore: multiple queues, unchecked jostling and no trained personnel to intervene when tempers flared.


In 2013, nearly 115 people died during the Kumbh Mela in Allahabad. In 2008, 224 were killed at the Chamunda Devi temple in Jodhpur. Earlier, this year, 30 devotees died during the stampede at the ‘Maha Kumbh’ in Prayagraj. Each time, officials promise inquiries. Each time, they fail to act on lessons learned.


Goa’s Chief Minister Pramod Sawant announced a magisterial inquiry but seemed more interested in suggesting ‘provocation’ than admitting institutional failure. Such evasions are as dangerous as the failures they obscure. Faith-based gatherings are a fixture of Indian life. Their scale is no secret. But year after year, the state is caught flat-footed. If the government can manage cricket stadiums and G20 summits with military efficiency, why can’t it do the same for a religious gathering it knows will draw a massive crowd?


The answer lies in a lethal mix of complacency, political cowardice and religious tokenism. No one wants to antagonise religious organisers or question sacred rituals, even when they defy logic or endanger lives. Planning becomes perfunctory. Responsibility is diffused. And when disaster strikes, all that follows is finger-pointing, condolences and inquiries that vanish into the bureaucratic ether.


What India needs is not more rituals, but more rigour. The country must develop enforceable national protocols for crowd control at large gatherings, religious or otherwise. That means trained personnel, digital monitoring of crowd density, physical barriers and staggered access routes. It means removing responsibility from local police alone and placing it with specialised disaster-prevention units with real authority. And it means holding officials and organisers accountable when they fail.


India must stop blaming chaos on the gods and start blaming it where it belongs: on the living.

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