top of page

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.

The Hidden Costs of Wasting Food and Water

Wasting food is not just about hunger and starving people — it is about wasted water, energy, and effort.

Hello readers,

People love food – not only to get enough energy our bodies need but also because it’s often the centre of social events; we celebrate with food, and it’s simply delicious. So it’s quite a surprise that one-third of the food in the world doesn’t make it to our plates. That amounts to an incredible 1.3 billion tonnes of food! This amount of food could feed around 3 billion people each year. That exceeds the number of all the hungry people worldwide by nearly 4 times! Can you guess what we waste the most? Well, we will discuss that later. The day before, we celebrated the International Day for Forests or World Forestry Day, and yesterday we celebrated World Water Day. Both forests and water are the most precious natural resources for food production. World Forestry Day was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly on 21st March 2012. Since then, March 21st every year has been celebrated, keeping the forests at centre stage.


This year, the theme for this day is “Forests and Food” to highlight the crucial role forests play in food security, nutrition, and livelihoods across the globe. With unsustainable food systems driving deforestation and biodiversity loss, the messaging for the day focused on “The ABCs of Forests: Adapt, Balance, Change”—a call to rethink how forests and food systems interact. A- Adapt food systems to work with forests and not against them; B - Balance and share benefits equitably and effectively; C- Change policies.


Forests are the pillars of global food security and nutrition and provide the livelihoods of millions of families. They provide essential foods such as fruits, seeds, roots, and wild meat, the fundamental resources for indigenous and rural communities.


Yesterday, the world observed World Water Day, held annually on March 22nd since 1993 to highlight the importance of freshwater and promote its sustainable management. It is about taking action to tackle the global water crisis. Water resources and food production are closely linked with each other. Globally, agriculture accounts for 72 percent of global freshwater withdrawals—amounting to nearly 3,000 cubic kilometres of water—taken from the world’s rivers, lakes, and groundwater aquifers each year. In developing countries like India, water withdrawal for food production is about 90 percent. For harvesting one kilogram of wheat, more than 1800 litres of water is utilised. That means, when we waste food equivalent to one kilogramme of wheat, we waste 1800 liters of water!


Additionally, there is a wastage of energy used by the farmer to irrigate the wheat crop; there is wastage of manpower, and hard work put in by the farmer physically and emotionally-; then there is wastage of other resources as well.


In my next article, I will throw more light on this aspect of food waste. On this occasion of World Water Day, plan your day to minimise the wastage of water!


(The author is an environmentalist. Views personal.)

Comments

bottom of page