No 'operation Lotus' planned in Maha: Chandrakant Patil

The government will collapse under its own weight as the Sena's ideology is not compatible with that of the Congress-NCP, Union minister Nitin Gadkari said

Even as BJP leaders Devendra Fadnavis and Nitin Gadkari claimed on Sunday that the coalition government in Maharashtra would not last long, state BJP chief Chandrakant Patil said his party was not trying to bring it down.

No "operation Lotus" is afoot, he said.

"There are no plans to bring down the Maha Vikas Aghadi government. We are not planning any 'operation Lotus' here. We will continue to work as a strong opposition," Patil told reporters in Pune.

"Maharashtra's politics used to be more honest than that of other states. But like hailstorms and droughts are unpredictable, so is the state's politics," he said.

The Uddhav Thackeray-led coalition government of the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress came to power in November last year after the Sena broke its alliance with the BJP.

Earlier in the day, speaking in Nagpur during a campaign for zilla parishad polls, Fadnavis said, "The government was formed by deceit. It would not last for even six months.

"The Shiv Sena has shown how low it can stoop for its selfish gains by joining hands with NCP and Congress," said the former chief minister.

Gadkari said, "The Congress has been insulting Vinayak Damodar Savarkar every now and then, but the Sena is glued to power and not even objecting. They are helpless for power."