When senior Congress leader and former Maharashtra chief minister Sushil Kumar Shinde made the startling claim last Wednesday that he had been approached by the BJP twice to join its fold, he was looking to project the state BJP’s policy of expansion, which would involve the ruling party’s bid to ensure the decimation of the Opposition players, especially the Congress.

Officially, state BJP president Chandrashekhar Bawankule has denied the BJP ever making the offer to Shinde. Bawankule on Thursday reiterated, “The BJP has not made formal offer to anybody. Nobody has made any offer to Sushil Kumar Shinde. But if anybody wants to join the BJP because they accept PM Narendra Modi’s leadership and development agenda, we will gladly welcome them.”

The BJP’s playbook seems to be evident: reach out to individual Opposition leaders or “engineer” splits in the Opposition parties as part of its expansion drive.

As a seasoned politician with vast experience — Sushil Kumar Shinde has also been a former Union home minister, and Governor — the Congress veteran would have been a prize catch for the BJP. However, Shinde, for the moment, has chosen to remain loyal to the Congress and the Gandhi family. He said, “There was no question of ever joining the BJP.”

Affirming that Shinde’s allegation has merit, another former Congress chief minister, requesting anonymity, said, “Before the 2019 elections, an RSS/BJP ideologue had subtly indicated I should join them. I had spurned the offer then and there, citing ideological differences.”

Either way, what Shinde and Bawankule’s statements have done is to put the focus on the reserved Solapur Lok Sabha constituency in western Maharashtra which is poised to witness a direct contest between the Congress and the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. The challenge for the BJP is to find a suitable candidate for Solapur in 2024.

Highly placed sources in the BJP revealed the party is unlikely to field sitting MP Jaisidheshwar Swami. The reason cited is the court case related to his caste certificate. In 2020, the party was embarrassed as his caste certificate was challenged in court, which termed it invalid.

Insiders believe the BJP will spring a surprise candidate in Solapur. Among the names doing the rounds is Amar Sable, the BJP Solapur in-charge and former Rajya Sabha MP. Another name is that of the Malshiras MLA Ram Satpute. However, a formal decision on the party’s candidate is awaited.

The political managers in the BJP said, “The BJP has a strong organisational base in Solapur. With the right candidate, it won’t have any problem in retaining the seat.”

The Congress is considering between Sushil Kumar Shinde and his daughter MLA Pranati Shinde, with the father backing his daughter as the Lok Sabha candidate.

The Solapur Lok Sabha seat has six assembly segments — Mohol, Solapur North, Solapur Central, Akkalkot, Solapur South, Pandharpur. Four of the seats are held by the BJP, and one by alliance partner NCP (Ajit Pawar faction).

While Solapur Central Assembly seat is represented by Pranati Shinde of the Congress, Monol has Yashwant Mane of the NCP faction led by Ajit Pawar. Solapur North has the BJP’s Vijay Deshmukh, Akkalkot has the BJP’s Sachin Kalyanshetti, Solapur South BJP’s Subash Deshmukh and Pandharpur BJP’s Samadhan Autade.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the presence of the Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) had proved helpful to the BJP, as it dented the Congress vote bank. VBA candidate Prakash Ambedkar had polled 1,70,007 votes (15.68% vote share). The BJPs Jaisidheshwar Swami polled 5,24,958 votes (48.33%) and Sushil Kumar Shinde of the Congress polled 3,66,377 (33.78%). Together, Shinde and Ambedkar’s votes edge past the BJP’s total, and even though votes aren’t cast or transferred in such linear fashion, this appears to be the sole concern for the BJP.

Sushil Kumar Shinde has represented Solapur Lok Sabha as Congress MP in 1998, 1999 and 2009. The Congress has won the seat six other times. Overall, Shinde is seen as not only a strong Dalit face, but also someone with a wide acceptance in Solapur.

Hence, the BJP fears a straight fight might give the Congress some hope. Not something that the BJP wants to leave to chance.