Both BJP and Shiv Sena are equally responsible for the breakup of alliance. Sena Chief Uddhav Thackeray had initially said that he aspires to become the Chief Minister and his party was keen to contest election on 151 seats. BJP as a national party made it a prestige issue and called off the alliance. Now, why are you repenting? Be firm on your initial position and don’t bother about the results. Go full steam and see what happens.
Narendra Modi is not going to be the Chief Minister of Maharashtra so he should announce the name of the party’s Chief Ministerial candidate and let him do most of the talking and campaigning. Otherwise, people will feel that BJP will install a puppet CM to be remote controlled from Delhi and Nagpur. NCP has committed a mistake. The party should have announced the name of Sharad Pawar as Chief Ministerial candidate and could have won easily. But now, people will not vote for Ajit Pawar.
Congress leader Milind Deora is not visible nowadays. Deora might be thinking that it is better to promote family business instead of sweating it out in heat on Mumbai streets. What will happen after parties call of alliance? They will start bargaining after the conclusion of election. No prizes for guessing who is known to be the best bargainer. However, the right thing will be to nominate Sharad Pawar as CM, backed by Senas ( both). Even Raj Thackeray won’t mind to be included in the cabinet led by Sharad Pawar. Pawar won’t stand to gain much by having an alliance with BJP. I hope he already knows it. Reportedly, even Balasaheb Thackeray wanted him to provide guidance to Uddhav.
I had initially thought that Nitin Gadkari should become the CM few weeks ago but he is more comfortable holding a cabinet rank in Delhi. The same aspect is applicable here. If BJP would have announced Nitin Gadkari’s name for the Chief Ministerial post, they can look forward to securing a majority. Thus they have been making mistakes. The voter will become confused. He will shut his eyes, let his finger fall on the EVM automatically and may seek divine guidance at this moment. There is no scope left for a rational choice, by and large. It’s the parties fault for breaking alliance thereby creating confusion in the mind of voters.