DAY after Patole resignation: Carve out Vidarbha state, BJP MLA writes to CM Devendra Fadnavis

The letter, which comes two days before the winter session of the legislature begins here, is reminiscent of the rebellious protests by Patole in 2009, when he was in the Congress, against his own (Congress) government on injustice to Vidarbha and farmers’ woes. Patole had then quit the Congress to join the BJP. Deshmukh, son of former Congress state chief Ranjit Deshmukh, had joined the BJP ahead of the 2014 elections. After the polls, he had openly petitioned Nitin Gadkari to take up the chief ministership of the state.

Deshmukh’s letter states, “Nagpur is the second most crime-prone city in the country despite you being the chief minister and state home minister. The city tops in crime against children. How should one accept these facts considering you are from Nagpur? The National Crime Records Bureau states Maharashtra tops the list of corrupt states for the past three years. You are reducing corruption but since the state is very big, you are possibly falling short of expectations.” Pointing out that unlike the previous governments, for the first time, Vidarbha has cornered top ministries, Deshmukh rues it has brought no development to the region. “The Finance Minister (Sudhir Mungantiwar) is from Vidarbha. But the region has failed to get enough financial allocation, particularly in irrigation,” he says.

“The agriculture ministry belongs to a Vidarbhite (Pandurang Phundkar). This should have led to a drop in farmers’ suicides. On the contrary they have gone up. Non-remunerative prices to farm produce, farmers’ deaths due to insecticide, pest attacks on crops and tortuous procedure of loan waiver to farmers have all complicated matters,” Deshmukh adds.

Stating that projects like MIHAN have proved non-starters, Deshmukh said the proposed textile parks at Yavatmal and Buldana have also not progressed. In the Amravati textile parks, Raymonds and Siyaram haven’t been purchasing Vidarbha’s cotton but are importing it from foreign countries, she claimed. Mango in Konkan, grapes and bananas in north Maharashtra and sugarcane in west Maharashtra have enjoyed state patronage leading to processing industries in those areas, but Vidarbha’s orange has not been paid attention, he said.

Despite Vidarbha producing over 70 per cent electricity in the state, people in the region have to buy it at a high price of Rs 7.5 per unit while Mumbai and Pune enjoy uninterrupted power at Vidarbha’s cost, he said and virtually termed Nagpur’s metro, Smart City, cement road and the Samruddhi Communication Superhighway as misplaced priorities. “If money spent on these had been provided as subsidies to industries, then lot of employment would have been generated. In the last few years, a lot of small industries have closed down. I wonder instead of taking up such big projects, why doesn’t your government feel like undertaking a concrete action programme to ameliorate the farmers’ lot,” he said. He said lack due to lack of jobs, youth from the region have been migrating to Mumbai and Pune and along with them, their parents too are leaving.

Reminding the CM of the promise to carve out a separate state, Deshmukh said, “You have said the subject is in the Centre’s court but the party has government in state as well as Centre and has visionary leadership in the form of Narendra Modi and Amit Shah. Together, with them, you can certainly carve out a separate Vidarbha state and become its chief minister too.”