MUMBAI: A day after deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar described himself as the NCP president in an open letter to the people of Maharashtra, the Sharad Pawar faction of NCP, in a befitting reply, said that he has surrendered Maharashtra’s self-respect before New Delhi in the last 100 days since he joined the Eknath Shinde-led government.
Ajit Pawar, in the open letter, had said in the 100 days in the three-party state government, the NCP led by him has followed the path shown by “the architect of modern Maharashtra”, Yashwantrao Chavan and worked for the cause of the poor and downtrodden.
In response, on Wednesday, the Sharad Pawar faction posted on X that in the last 100 days, the Ajit Pawar faction has completely ignored the teachings of Mahatma Phule, Shahu Maharaj and Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar and miserably failed to tackle the woes of farmers. It furt- her said that Ajit Pawar’s NCP joined hands with people who resorted to lathicharge on Marathas agitating for reservation and shared power with people who were directly responsible for largescale deaths in government-run medical colleges owing to acute shortage of medicines and manpower.
The Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadanvis-Ajit Pawar government miserably failed to generate jobs and halt shifting of key industrial projects to neighbouring states, said the Sharad Pawar camp, adding: “For the last 100 days, the Ajit Pawar faction was with people who delayed reservation to Maratha, Lingayat, OBC and Dhangar communities and are anti-Marathi.”
Above all, the group added, the biggest failure of the Ajit Pawar faction was that it had to give such a “long explanation to the people of Maharashtra” as to why he joined the Shinde camp. The faction further claimed that only Sharad Pawar can do justice to “progressive Maharashtra” as he will never surrender before New Delhi.
The dispute over which faction of the NCP should have the party name and symbol and who is its president is pending before the Election Commission of India.