The Coronavirus pandemic has brought the fissures in the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) out in the open. The alliance of compromised morals built upon devilish motives was always going to be a bumpy ride for Uddhav Thackeray, the son of Hindu Hriday Samrat Bala Sahab Thackeray. The COVID-19 situation has brought down Mumbai on its knees and despite all the money spent on PR activities by the ‘young Turk’ Aditya Thackeray, surprisingly the cases have not come down.
The inexperience and immaturity Uddhav has shown in dealing with the pandemic may have alleviated him to top of the list of worst CM’s in Indian history. In Mumbai alone, 35,485 positive cases of COVID-19 have been reported, of which 1,135 people have died. When people talked about Mumbai leading the charts, it was regarding economic development, not in the coronavirus cases tally.
While Uddhav has failed to contain the virus, he has also failed to control the alliance as the old fox Sharad Pawar has started making his moves to oust him. Pawar met the governor a few days back which set the political circuit abuzz with speculations regarding the NCP supremo going behind Thackeray’s back to perform an elaborate maneuver. The difference of opinion regarding the opening of the lockdown has also wielded a wedge between the two leaders.
The misery has been further compounded by MVA’s another alliance partner Congress and its young leader Rahul Gandhi distancing himself and the party from the mess Uddhav has created by stating that Congress was only a supporting power in the state.
It all but points out to one thing that Uddhav has been left alone in the shark tank to fend for himself. But Uddhav has no one to blame as he made the bed with NCP and Congress himself.
Uddhav is so busy fighting Coronavirus and getting his house in order that he has given cold shoulder to the economic revival of the state. When companies around the world are looking to jump the sinking ship of China and looking to place their anchors in a country like India, Uddhav has completed missed the train. Speaking of missing the train, it would not be the first time as one of the first hara-kiri decisions he took after assuming the chair was putting the hyperloop project between Mumbai-Pune on hold.
The city of Mumbai which was once seen emulating financial centres of the likes of New York, London, Hong Kong is ravaged by the Coronavirus. Amid the ongoing crisis in Hong Kong, the city’s ranking has dropped as a top global financial centre and it is expected to dip further.
The situation in Mumbai seems much dire than the original epicentre of Wuhan and it is all because of Uddhav Thackeray’s incompetence. The leadership looks devoid of any ideas and its ‘testing, testing, testing’ strategy has not worked one bit as the positivity rate is as high as 12 percent, the only state with double-digit positivity rate.
Maharashtra which contributes over 14 percent to India’s GDP has been the worst-hit and it will easily take a couple of years to recuperate from the shock assuming the insipid Thackeray government can keep the virus in check in the coming months.
The Coronavirus pandemic has been the test of mettle of political leaders and while Thackeray has been a bummer, another state CM has surprised everybody with his effective governance style.
Yogi Adityanath, CM of the country’s most populous state is fighting the battle with coronavirus and simultaneously chalking plans to bring manufacturing companies to the state from China.
He has revamped the labour laws, canceling over 38 obsolete laws for three years, and conducted meetings with several big blue-chip companies. As a result, a German shoe manufacturing company has already announced that it is coming to UP.
If Uddhav has to learn how to handle a crisis, he should look nowhere than up to Adityanath and see how a monk-CM has turned a raggedy state on its head.
When former Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis was at the helm of affairs his government had started developing Mumbai as an international financial centre to provide investors with the best financial services. Many big investors were also attracted by the then government. For example, the Russian company Novolipastek Steel was to invest Rs. 6,800 crore in two phases in Maharashtra by the year 2022. Fadnavis had a vision and people re-elected the BJP-Sena coalition. However, Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena let the people of Maharashtra down by betraying the mandate of the people.
Under Uddhav Thackeray, Maharashtra’s growth story has been hard-braked. The country’s financial capital needed a better leader and if things do not improve from Uddhav’s side shortly, the state is staring at a bleak future.
