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Baghel predicts ‘more upheavals’ in Maharashtra with ‘autorickshaw’ dig
On Sunday, Ajit Pawar led a vertical split in the NCP to become the deputy chief minister, shocking his uncle Sharad Pawar, who founded the party 24 years ago.
Hitting out the BJP's “double engine” government pitch in states, Chhattisgarh chief minister Bhupesh Baghel on Sunday said NCP leader Ajit Pawar's support to the Shinde-Fadnavis government made it a "three-wheel" autorickshaw.
Ajit Pawar, who was the leader of the Opposition in the Maharashtra assembly, rebelled against his uncle, NCP president Sharad Pawar, and joined the NDA government as chief minister Eknath Shinde's deputy, alongside BJP's Devendra Fadnavis. Apart from Ajit Pawar, eight NCP MLAs, including prominent leaders like Praful Patel and Chhagan Bhujbal, were also inducted into the new cabinet.
Asserting there would be further upheavals in the Maharashtra government, Baghel said, “I saw Devendra Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar sitting side by side and smiling, while CM Shinde, sitting on the other side of the governor, seemed disappointed.”
"Last time, a split was engineered of the Shiv Sena and this time it is of the NCP. Earlier, there was a double-engine government and now it is a three-wheel autorickshaw," he said.
Baghel also said NCP chief Sharad Pawar had not "opened his cards".
"More upheavals will take place. People do not like such developments and its impact will be seen in the future," the Chhattisgarh CM claimed.
Last year, when Eknath Shinde rebelled against Uddhav Thackeray, the latter took a similar jibe at the Maharashtra chief minister, calling him an autorickshaw driver whose brakes failed. Referring to an incident where Fadnavis asked Shinde to stop talking, Thackeray had said, “But how will it stop? The brakes of the autorickshaw failed. Earlier, the BJP used to call the MVA government a three-wheeler government but now the person who drives a three-wheeler is running the government.”
