Sena trustworthy ally: NCP chief dismisses doubts

Days after chief minister Uddhav Thackeray held a one-on-one meeting with Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar said he does not doubt that the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government will complete its five-year term

Days after chief minister Uddhav Thackeray held a one-on-one meeting with Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar said he does not doubt that the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government will complete its five-year term. Not only this, but the three-party coalition will also perform well in the upcoming Lok Sabha and Assembly elections. He also said that Shiv Sena is a trustworthy party and it has, in the past, kept its promise to former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by helping Congress.

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The NCP supremo was addressing party workers and leaders on the eve of the 22nd foundation day of the party, at NCP headquarters, on Thursday. This was his first appearance at a public function after he was hospitalised in April for gall bladder surgery and treatment for a mouth ulcer.

NCP was launched on June 10, 1999, after a fallout with the then Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

“There was a lot of buzz soon after the chief minister’s one-on-one meeting with the Prime Minister in Delhi. As I said we have never worked with Shiv Sena in the past but Maharashtra has been watching the party for the past many years… Shiv Sena is a party that can be trusted even if people are raising doubts following the (PM-CM) meeting, I have no doubt that the MVA government will not only complete its tenure of five years but will also perform well in the Lok Sabha and state assembly elections and represent the state and the country,” Pawar said in his 20 minutes speech.

To prove his point, the veteran leader shared an incident when late Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray decided to support Congress and did not contest a single seat in the state Assembly elections.

“After Morarji Desai led Janata Party came to power at Centre, Congress was facing defeat in all the states. At that time, only one party came ahead in support and that was Shiv Sena. Balasaheb Thackeray promised not to field a single candidate in the state Assembly elections in Maharashtra then and also fulfilled his promise. He didn’t even care about the impact of his decision on the organisation and kept his word (given to Indira Gandhi),” Pawar pointed out.

Before that, he said that the people of Maharashtra had accepted the unusual coalition as no one would have thought about NCP joining hands with Shiv Sena. “We did that and fortunately people accepted the alternative. I remember senior journalists associated with newspapers and news channels guessing the number of days the MVA government was going to last since day one but all this has stopped now,” Pawar said indicating that the party leadership took the right decision of forming the MVA government along with Shiv Sena and Congress in 2019.

The NCP chief said the MVA government will have to resolve the issue of reservations for the Maratha community as well as for the OBC community. He said that the NCP will have to ensure that the power will be shared with more people to prevent it from getting corrupted. “Power gets corrupted if it is concentrated and thus should be shared with more people. We will have to ensure that Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe, Other Backward Classes and all the other communities are getting their share of power,” he said.

This was the second consecutive year when the party decided not to celebrate the foundation day considering the Covid-19 pandemic. Selected leaders and workers were invited to attend a small gathering organized at NCP headquarters at Ballard Pier in south Mumbai. Pawar’s address was made live on social media platforms for the party workers and leaders across the state. State president Jayant Patil, deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar, senior leader Praful Patel and health minister Rajesh Tope too addressed the gathering.