Mumbai: Eighteen Shiv Sena Lok Sabha members boycotted the customary parliamentarians’ meeting called on Friday morning by Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis for discussing coverage of state projects in the upcoming Union Budget, calling it a “farce”. A day earlier, on Thursday, Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray had declared that his party would contest the upcoming BMC and other civic bodies’ elections on its own.
Sena MP Arvind Sawant, acting on the instructions of the Sena chief, not only told the CM about the party’s decision to boycott the meeting but also handed him the demand letters addressed to Union finance minister Arun Jaitley. The CM eventually chaired the meeting where Congress alleged the central government was being apathetic towards Maharashtra.
Ahead of the budget session, the state CMs in the past had called all MPs from the state to discuss state issues that have been pending with the Centre. But the Sena leadership raised an objection to the practice this year. Mr Thackeray asked his South Mumbai Mr Sawant to meet Mr Fadanvis and conveyed the decision of boycott.
Later, speaking to The Asian Age, Mr Sawant said, “If the meeting was about demands to be made in the budget, it should have held much earlier. Now just three days are left for the budget to be declared. Even if we pushed for our demands to be accommodated in the budget, the central government will not give us hearing in Delhi. So why should we participate in such a meeting, which is nothing but a farce?”
A fortnight ago, Shiv Sena had written a letter to finance minister Arun Jaitley. In that letter, party has made demands of tax convention up to Rs 5 lakh of income, waiving off loans offarmers and others. Mr Sawant also gave same letter to Mr Fadnavis. CM assured him of accommodating these demands in letter that state governent will sent to central finance ministry. But BJP underplayed the boycott and refused to comment on it.
