Shiv Sena makes big Nitin Gadkari claim amid Maharashtra deadlock

Amid the impasse over government formation in Maharashtra, farm activist Kishore Tiwari, who joined the Shiv Sena ahead of the Assembly polls, has said RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat should depute Union minister Nitin Gadkari to resolve the power-tussle between the BJP and the Sena. In a letter to Bhagwat, Tiwari said the RSS chief should take a serious note of the situation and intervene to end the deadlock over government formation in Maharashtra.

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'People worried over Sangh's silence'

He said people were worried over the Sangh's "silence" on the issue. "Gadkari will be able to resolve the situation within two hours," Tiwari said, when asked about his letter to Bhagwat. Claiming that Gadkari is being "sidelined" by the BJP, Tiwari said if the party or Amit Shah authorise Gadkari to intervene, he can resolve the impasse in two hours. Tiwari, founder of Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti, an NGO which highlighted large-scale suicides by farmers in Maharashtra, especially those from his Vidarbha region, switched over from the BJP to the Shiv Sena ahead of the October 24 polls.

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The BJP and Shiv Sena are engaged in a standoff over sharing the chief minister's post, with the Uddhav Thackeray- led party demanding an equal division of the top post's tenure and the BJP rejecting the same. Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut has asserted that the next chief minister of the state will be from his party. Multiple high-profile meetings in New Delhi and Mumbai on Monday, including one between NCP chief Sharad Pawar and Congress president Sonia Gandhi, failed to give any indication of breaking the 11-day-long deadlock over government formation in the state.

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