In a thinly veiled jibe at Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar on Tuesday said that those who had cooled their heels in the jail had no right to question what he [Mr. Pawar] had done for Maharashtra.
He hit out at those leaders who had deserted the NCP ahead of the Maharashtra Assembly election. The NCP chief said that they would soon be relegated to history while expressing confidence that the political picture would look very different after the conclusion of the State Assembly polls.
“One of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s leaders [Mr. Shah] who came here [in Solapur] demanded to know my contribution towards Maharashtra… Those who have cooled their heels in the jail dare not question what I have done for the State,” said the NCP chief, remarking: “while I may have done many things, I have never been to jail.”
Mr. Pawar was addressing a large gathering of his supporters in Solapur district on the commencement of the first phase of his State-wide tour to rally the party rank-and-file ahead of the elections.
Mr. Shah had attacked Mr. Pawar and the Congress in his Solapur address during the BJP’s pre-poll ‘Mahajanadesh Yatra’ in the district.
In a caustic response today, the NCP chief was referred to Mr. Shah’s brief period in jail in 2010 following his arrest by the Central Bureau of Investigation in connection with the Sohrabuddin Sheikh case.
The unrelenting exodus of several big party leaders has compelled the 79-year-old NCP chief to take plunge into the poll arena to revive his Party’s sagging morale.
Mr. Pawar also lambasted Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and other Ministers of the ruling BJP, recalling that when he was the Chief Minister at the time of the devastating 1993 Latur earthquake, he was personally overseeing operations from the epicentre in Killari (in Latur).
“In contrast, the ruling government’s ministers only conducted aerial surveys on helicopter at the time of the Sangli and Kolhapur floods and disappeared from the afflicted spot after half-an-hour,” he said.
Taking potshots at former NCP stalwarts including Vijaysinh Mohite-Patil and Dilip Sopal who had switched alliances to enter the BJP, Mr. Pawar, without naming them said that the people would put such leaders in their place at the time of the elections.
“Do not worry about those who have left...this is only the first phase in this fight. The people in this self-respecting district will put such weaklings [NCP turncoats] in their place…Henceforth, speak of those young leaders who are about to take the Party to victory,” the NCP chief told his supporters, remarking spiritedly that while he might be nudging 80, he was not old and had yet to defeat many political opponents.
