Mumbai: In a sudden political development in Maharashtra, senior Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Ajit Pawar – the nephew of party chief Sharad Pawar – on Sunday split the legislative party and joined the state’s NDA ministry with eight other MLAs.
Sixty-three-year-old Pawar Junior has joined the state’s NDA government for the second time since 2019, when he had a short-lived tryst as deputy CM before returning to the NCP fold in two days.
Ajit Pawar, so long the leader of the opposition, took over as the second Deputy Chief Minister (after BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis) on Sunday when he was administered the oath by state Governor Ramesh Bais at Raj Bhavan here in the presence of NCP veteran Praful Patel – a longtime close confidant of Sharad Pawar.
Although Patel did not take oath as state minister, there is speculation that he may be inducted into the Union ministry.
A few other NCP MLAs will be included in the Shinde ministry soon, Pawar told media persons after taking his oath, and said he took the decision for the development of the country and “to solve the problems of the people of Maharashtra.”
He showered praise on Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Shinde, who himself became the chief minister a year back by engineering a similar split in the ruling Shiv Sena after rebelling against the then chief minister and party chief Uddhav Thackeray, claimed 35 out of NCP’s 54 MLAs were present in the Raj Bhavan along with Pawar.
In all, the new Deputy Chief Minister enjoyed the support of more than 40 NCP legislators, he said.
After Pawar, Chhagan Bhujbal, Dilip Valse-Patil, Hasan Mushrif, Dhananjay Munde, Dharmaraobaba Bhagwantrao Atram, Aditi Tatkare, Sanjay Bansode and Anil Patil also were sworn in as ministers.
Profusely praising Ajit Pawar, Shinde said he has always done the politics of development and said now his double engine government – BJP and the Shiv Sena (Shinde) – has a triple engine for the development of the state.
Pawar’s joining would give a further boost to the government which was already working for the state’s development under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Shinde added.
On the other hand, NCP president Sharad Pawar distanced himself and tried to downplay the action of his nephew Ajit Pawar and said the latter’s action was not new for him.
He warned that the party will take action against Ajit Pawar, Praful Patel Sunil Tatkare and other NCP MLAs for their role,
Sharad Pawar added that he will seek people’s opinion on today’s political development, rather than moving court against them.
While, NCP’s Maharashtra Chief Spokesperson Mahesh Tapase termed the developments as part of BJP’s ‘Operation Lotus’ programme.
Commenting on the NCP split in the state, Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) President Nana Patole stated that yet again the Bharatiya Janata Party has joined forces with a faction of the Nationalist Congress Party by “playing the politics of sabotage”.
“It is a perverted pattern of the BJP to do anything for power as public support for them is declining,” he said and added that people of the state will teach a lesson to the BJP in the upcoming elections.
Congress Legislature Party leader and MLA Balasaheb Thorat has called Sunday’s political development in Maharashtra — the split in its ally NCP and the swearing-in of Ajit Pawar with eight other MLAs — as “unfortunate for democracy and the Constitution” and expressed that people of the state will determine the political future of these leaders in forthcoming assembly elections.
Over the past couple of months, political circles in the state were agog with speculation about the possibility of Ajit Pawar jumping ship.
Ajit Pawar was said to be unhappy over being sidelined in the party, with Sharad Pawar elevating Supriya Sule and Praful Patel as working presidents.
Recently, Ajit Pawar also wanted to quit as Leader of the Opposition and sought an organisational responsibility, but the party national executive asked him to wait for two months.
UNI
