Union minister Prakash Javadekar’s frequent trips to Chhindwara and the BJP’s special focus on it could be a wake-up call for Congress heavyweight and former Union minister Kamal Nath, who has been winning Lok Sabha elections from this seat in Madhya Pradesh for over three decades.
Although Mr Javadekar hails from Maharashtra, he is the sitting Rajya Sabha member from Madhya Pradesh. He said he was spending his MPLAD Fund on developmental work in Chhindwara. “Three BJP legislators and councillors suggest works to me and I allocate funds accordingly,” he said.
He said he was familiar with Chhindwara, which is near Nagpur. “And I used to go to Nagpur for jansamparkh,” he told a group of reporters. Mr Javadekar has been focusing on civic problems and health issues in Chhindwara after realising that the BJP has not been able to snatch the Lok Sabha seat from the Congress despite being in power in Madhya Pradesh for over two decades.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi could not deliver a “Congress-mukta Madhya Pradesh” (Congress-free Madhya Pradesh) in the 2014 Lok Sabha election because of Mr Kamal Nath, a 9th term member of the Lok Sabha. He fought the election and retained his seat in the midst of the Modi wave at a time when other senior Congress leaders were either reluctant or lacked confidence to face the people.
Now the BJP’s next target seems to be Chhindwara rather than Guna, from where the Congress’ Jyotiraditya Scindia has been winning after his late father Madhavrao. The Congress won only two seats from this state — Chhindwara and Guna — in the current Lok Sabha.
Mr Javadekar, a hardliner with a soft face, has been known as a man of organisation in the BJP. But his frequent visits to Chhindwara have already alerted Congress central leaders.
Mr Kamal Nath, who has worked with the late Sanjay Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Indira Gandhi, and P.V. Narasimha Rao, and later with Dr Manmohan Singh and Mrs Sonia Gandhi, in the party and in government, has nurtured his constituency so well that even the Modi wave and the RSS’ network could not make a dent in it.
