Sharad Pawar slams PM Modi for ‘using’ government programs to target opposition

The NCP supremo said he has seen and heard speeches of prime ministers right from Jawaharlal Nehru, but claimed that no one did ‘something like this’

Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar, who turned 82 on Monday, slammed Prime Minister Narendra Modi for “using government platforms to target opposition parties”, something which the veteran NCP leader claimed ‘has never happened’.

Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar addresses party workers on his 82nd birthday in Mumbai on Monday. (PTI Photo)

Stating that prime ministers never used government events or programmes to attack opposition, and respected opposition as part of the democratic set up, Pawar said, “They used to speak against them only while addressing political rallies and in the election campaign.”

On Sunday, after inaugurating the All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS) campus in Nagpur, PM Modi said political parties are betraying voters by adopting politics for short-term gains, and they cannot let shortcut politics dictate the fate of the country.

“This is happening for the first time that the prime minister, who was in Nagpur, used government programmes such as flagging off a new train, inaugurating a hospital and an expressway to criticise opposition parties. It is time to think how appropriate this is,” Pawar said.

The NCP supremo said he has seen and heard speeches of prime ministers right from Jawaharlal Nehru, but claimed that no one did ‘something like this’. “Even in his election campaigns, Nehru never used to criticise the opposition and only used kept his stand vociferously. He used to respect the fact that the opposition, opposition leaders are part of democracy. This has been maintained by all prime ministers of the country since Independence, but not now,” the former Union minister said.

“Politicians should also understand that they are leading the country,” Pawar added.