- Friday, February 28, 2025
Ajit Pawar and eight other members of the Nationalist Congress Party joined the Shiv Sena-BJP government in the state and were also appointed as ministers.
By: Shubham Ghosh
THE Indian opposition’s ambition to dethrone the Narendra Modi government received a major blow on Sunday (2) when Ajit Pawar of the National Congress Party (NCP), a major opponent to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from the western state of Maharashtra, joined its government led by chief minister Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena and the BJP.
Pawar, 63, was joined by eight other NCP leaders and they took oath as ministers in the Shinde-Fadnavis government. Pawar himself was appointed as another deputy chief minister, something he has done for the third time in four years.
The eight others are Chhagan Bhujbal, Aditi Tatkare, Dhananjay Munde, Dilip Walse Patil, Sanjay Bansode, Hasan Mushrif, Dharmaraj Babarao Atram and Anil Bhaidas Patil.
Shinde, whose revolt split the Sena last year and saw the downfall of the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government of Maharashtra that featured the NCP and Indian National Congress, welcomed Pawar into the fold saying the state’s double-engine government has now turned into a triple-engine one. He said Pawar’s experience will help in the development of Maharashtra.
Sources said Pawar has the backing of 43 state legislators out of 53.
The political development took place just days after Pawar publicly expressed his desire to give up his role as the opposition leader in the state assembly.
Some NCP legislators were not pleased with party president Sharad Pawar, 82, to take a ‘unilateral’ decision of sharing the stage and allying with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi at an opposition meeting in Patna in the eastern state of Bihar recently, the Times of India reported.
The latest churn in the NCP took place a month after the senior Pawar, the uncle of Ajit, resigned as the party chief but decided to return to the post three days later saying he could not disrespect the feelings of the masses.
In November 2019, Ajit Pawar became the deputy chief minister of Maharashtra with Fadnavis as the chief minister following a split between the BJP and Sena but the government lasted just 80 hours as Pawar failed to have the NCP behind him.
