MNS puts up banners to mock BJP’s Ram Kadam, Mumbai’s least performing MLA

Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) workers have put up flex banners in Ghatkopar to poke fun at BJP MLA Ram Kadam, who was ranked as the ‘least performing’ functionary in the recently released MLA Report Card by NGO Praja.

The banner sarcastically congratulated the BJP MLA from Ghatkopar West for his bad performance. “Pappu can’t dance saala. Govinda aala re aala. Pappu punha napaas zhala,” its main heading reads.

The banners, one of which was put up outside Kadam’s house in Ghatkopar, were put up by MNS leader Ganesh Chukkal.

Putting up inflammatory hoardings and banners isn’t new for MNS. In the past, it has resorted to them to target rival leaders and parties. However, the relation with Kadam is more personal, as the leader was once a part of MNS.

A few years back, Kadam one of MNS chief Raj Thackeray’s closest aides. However, he switched to BJP in the presence of its party president Amit Shah in September 2014 over ‘internal issues’ and a newfound respect for Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

At the time, Kadam had claimed that his reason to leave MNS did not have anything to do with the leadership, but more so with other party workers. However, that did not go down well with Thackeray.

Praja, a non-partisan organisation, released the “Mumbai Report Card, MLA Ratings 2018” earlier this week. The report surveyed near 25,000 people to evaluate the performance of all 32 MLAs from Mumbai in the Maharashtra Vidhan Sabha.

In its report, it ranked the MLAs on the basis of their performance, based on factors ranging from attendance to quality of questions. Kadam was adjudged the least performing MLA in the report.

MNS, incidentally, does not have any MLA from Mumbai. Moreover, its tally came down from 13 MLAs in 2009 to just one in 2014.

It’s only MLA, Sharad Sonawane, who had won from Junnar assembly, was also booked for misbehaving with a female police officer in June.