Amit Shah meets Uddhav Thackeray

In a consensus building exercise ahead of the Presidential elections, BJP president Amit Shah on Sunday met his Shiv Sena counterpart Uddhav Thackeray and chiefs of other allies in Maharashtra.

The Amit Shah-Uddhav Thackeray meeting assumes significance in the wake of war-of-words between the two allies and Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis’s threat that his party was ready for mid-term polls after Shiv Sena ministers skipped a weekly Cabinet meeting and kept on targeting the BJP.

The meeting lasted for 75 minutes; however, there was no word on what exactly transpired in the meeting.

While Uddhav was accompanied by his son and Yuva Sena president Aditya Thackeray, Shah was accompanied by Fadnavis and BJP’s state unit chief Raosaheb Danve-Patil.

There has not been any official word on the meeting except for mere confirmation that it was a courtesy meeting and held on a cordial atmosphere.

Shiv Sena is the oldest ally of BJP and it does not want to go wrong this time as the Shiv Sena founder late Balasaheb Thackeray had supported Congress nominees - Pratibha Patil and Pranab Mukherjee in the Presidential elections in 2002 and 2012.  While Patil got the support on the ground that she was a Maharashtrian, Mukherjee had personal relations with the Thackeray family.

This time around initially Shiv Sena floated the name of RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat and later agriculture scientist M S Swaminathan.

Apparently, the Shiv Sena has kept its card close to its chest and want the BJP to finalise the name and seek support.

Shah on Sunday wrapped up his three-day visit to Mumbai during which he spoke to leaders of various parties as part of an exercise ahead of finalisation of NDA’s presidential candidate.

During the day, Shah also met Ramdas Athawale, the founder-president of  RPI (A), who is also the union minister for social justice and empowerment, Mahadev Jankar, the founder-president of Rashtriya Samaj Paksha and minister for animal husbandry, dairy development and fisheries, Vinayak Mete of Shiv Sangram, who is the chairman of the committee that is overseeing the Chhatrapati Shivaji memorial project and Vinay Kore, president of Jansurajya Party.

However, Shah could not have a meeting with Raju Shetti, the president of Swabhimani Shetkari Sangathan, who was one of those who is spearheading the farmer’s agitation.

In factShetti is agitated since the last few months over BJP poaching his colleague Sadabhau Khot, who is the minister of state for agriculture.

Shetti, who is in Delhi to plan for farmers agitation’ nationwide, was quoted saying: “Shetti said, “For me, politics is not important. The issue of farmers are serious and various leaders from all over the country are coming together. I decided to remain present for the farmers.”