The tussle between the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) and Prakash Ambedkar’s Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) is finally over, after the latter announced to go solo in the upcoming Lok Sabha Election in Maharashtra. VBA said it will contest from eight constituencies: Akola, Wardha, Bhandara-Gondiya, Gadchiroli-Chimur, Buldhana, Amravati and Yavatmal-Washim.
Ambedkar snapped ties with Shiv Sena (UBT) on March 23 due to differences over the number of seats offered to his party. Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) Maharashtra president Jayant Patil, however, said, “We are still trying to get Prakash Ambedkar with us even today. I spoke to him yesterday as well. We are willing to give him five seats.”
The MVA consists of Shiv Sena (UBT), Sharad Pawar’s NCP and Congress, with support from Samajwadi Party, CPI(M) and others.
Ambedkar’s Relations with MVA
Prakash Ambedkar, 69, is the grandson of Babasaheb Ambedkar, the architect of the Constitution of India. Prakash Ambedkar’s grandfather and Uddhav Thackeray’s grandfather Prabodhankar Thackeray had taken up the cause of social reforms together.
Ambedkar has been campaigning from Akola in Vidarbha region, and is in touch with Jalna-based Manoj Jarange-Patil, the face of Maratha reservation drive.
Ambedkar, a lawyer by profession, is a two-time Lok Sabha MP from Akola and one-term Rajya Sabha MP.
He founded Bharip Bahujan Mahasangh (BRP-BMS), which was rechristened to Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) on March 24, 2019. VBA includes Dalits, Tribal, Kolis, Agris, Dhangars, Banjaras, Malis, Kaikadis and other communities.
Last year, Ambedkar allied with the Shiv Sena calling it ‘Bhim Shakti and Shiv Shakti’. There were several questions about the alliance as NCP’s Sharad Pawar and Ambedkar have had trouble in the past. Later, Pawar agreed to take him on board.
Sources told News18 that the VBA leadership is “unhappy” with how the MVA has “treated them”. They further said Shiv Sena (UBT) also did not support Ambedkar during seat-sharing talks, and he felt that Uddhav Thackeray should have first held the talks with the VBA rather than the MVA.
VBA allied with Asaduddin Owaisi-led All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) in the 2019 Lok Sabha Elections. While AIMIM won Aurangabad seat, the VBA lost all 47 seats in Maharashtra and damaged the prospects of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)-Congress alliance in more than a dozen seats, cutting the Dalit-Muslim votes.
Ambedkar fought from Akola and Solapur seats, but lost them.
The split in vote benefited the BJP and Shiv Sena that swept the polls by winning 41 out of 48 seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. According to Ambedkar, the VBA secured 6.98 and 5.57 percentage vote share in the 2019 Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha polls, respectively. It garnered 41.3 lakh votes from all 48 Lok Sabha constituencies in the state.
Can VBA Divide Dalit-Muslim Votes?
VBA and Congress’ vote share collectively is much more than BJP’s in many constituencies of Maharashtra. The VBA-MVA split and Ambedkar’s decision to go solo in 2024 will indirectly help the BJP as its core Dalit and Muslim votes will be split between the two outfits.
As compared to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, VBA won substantial votes in 2019, which led to Congress-NCP’s defeat in nine seats. Former chief minister Ashok Chavan (Nanded), who has now joined the BJP, and Sushilkumar Shinde (Solapur) lost in the 2019 polls.
In 2014 Lok Sabha polls, Ambedkar’s BRP-BMS candidates contested on 23 parliamentary seats, securing a total vote share of 0.75%, but won none. It managed to get only 3.6 lakh votes in Maharashtra, that too, because of Ambedkar who contested from Akola.
What will be the Situation in 2024 Polls?
Ambedkar, who has floated the Third Front after discussions with Maratha reservation campaigner Manoj Jarange-Patil, had said at a press conference that the new outfit will declare the full ‘inclusive’ list of Lok Sabha candidates on April 2, which will include “poor, marginalised, underprivileged Marathas and Muslims, as mentioned in a report by Deccan Herald.
Jarange-Patil is yet to announce his decision by the weekend.
The VBA, however, has announced support to two Congress candidates – Vikas Thakare in Nagpur and Shrimant Shri Shahu Shahaji Chhatrapati Maharaj, who is the Congress-MVA candidate, the Deccan Herald report mentioned.
Among the candidates announced by VBA from the eight LS seats are: Prakash Ambedkar (Akola), Rajendra Salunke (Wardha), Sanjay Kewat (Bhandara-Gondiya), Hitesh Madavi (Gadchiroli-Chimur), Vasant Magar (Buldhana), Kumari Pillewan (Amravati) and Khemsing Pawar (Yavatmal-Washim).