It may have taken more than a month to finalise it, but the list of guardian ministers released on new year’s eve shows that home
minister R R Patil has kept his word.
Accepting the challenge to make a difference in the Naxal-affected Gadchiroli district, he has taken upon himself to be the guardian minister of arguably the most underdeveloped district of the state. Shivajirao Moghe, the seniormost member in the Ashok Chavan cabinet, has been given charge of Nagpur.
Moghe for Nagpur is a good news as he is seen a leader with clean and noncontroversial image. He was the district’s in-charge minister in the DF government’s first term too in 1999 and has a feel of things.
Moreover, given the nature of factional feuds between Congress leaders of the city which has shown no signs of receding in last one decade, Moghe could act a neutral umpire to oversee developmental needs of the district. As a social justice minister,Moghe is keen on taking up an effective statewide campaign to wean away youth and farmers from addiction of liquor and tobacco playing havoc in the countryside.
Of the eleven Vidarbha districts, the NCP has got four districts of Gadchiroli (R R Patil), Gondia (Vijaykumar Gavit), Washim (Anil Deshmukh) and Buldhana (Manohar Naik). The seven districts with the Congress are – Nagpur (Moghe), Yavatmal (Nitin Raut), Bhandara (Vijay Wadettiwar), Chandrapur (Ramesh Bagwe), Amravati (Rajendra Darda), Akola (Subhash Zanak) and Wardha (Ranjit Kamble). Significantly, a couple of weeks ago, R R Patil, known as aaba, had shown his keenness to be the Gadchiroli guardian minister.
“I am serious. This is not a gimmick. I want to bring about proper development of the district. We have seen that use of force against Naxalites may not solve the problem there. Without all-round development, any anti-Naxal operation can only be counterproductive as people there are craving for development. The situation should be made conducive for government staff to function there. Posting in the district should no longer be seen as a punishment,” he told TOI.
The delay in finalizing the list is attributed to differences between the ruling partners on whether to have a minister belonging to the same district as in-charge or get an outsider. Finally the ‘outsider’ camp prevailed with only one exception. Ranjit Kamble, minister of state for rural development and MLA from Deoli in Wardha, has got the chance to head the same district. Kamble is a kin of Himachal Pradesh governor Prabha Rau who seems to have prevailed in the district’s traditional party rivalry. The guardian minister plays a key role in development planning of the district and works as a link between the government and the bureaucracy.