Race on to claim credit

Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar's NCP is first off the block among the four major political parties in the state to claim credit for the loan waiver.

The NCP has organised farmers' rallies in various parts of the state to demonstrate its strength and project Pawar as the sole messiah of the farmers.

The NCP has already organised two rallies "" one at Akola in the farmer suicide affected Vidarbha and the other at Kolhapur in western Maharashtra.

Two more are planned: one at Airoli on the outskirts of Mumbai in the Raigadh district on Friday and another one at Beed in Marathwada, the home turf of BJP's national general secretary Gopinath Munde.

Pawar is expected to participate in the rallies at Airoli and Beed.

Shiv Sena, which had organised rallies in various parts of the state to demand loan waiver, is not also far behind. On the budget day itself, the party's workers distributed sweets in various parts of the state, claiming it was their agitation that compelled the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government to announce loan waiver.

This was immediately followed by two public meetings by the party's executive president Uddhav Thackeray in Vidarbha, where the party announced it would continue its agitation till all the farmers were given loan waiver.

However, it seems NCP's partner Congress and Sena's partner BJP were slow to react to the development.

Senior BJP leaders like Munde and state unit president Nitin Gadkari criticised the UPA government for conditional loan waiver and favouring western Maharashtra over Vidarbha and Marathwada, but there was no attempt from the party to mobilise support.

And Congress leaders, instead of trying to get maximum mileage from the loan waiver, were busy blaming each other for failing to publicise the loan waiver as a Congress gift.

On Tuesday, without naming Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, the state revenue minister said, "The state's leadership should have been more proactive in congratulating party president Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh."