Mumbai: The state BJP is furious as hell with deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar, who heads his faction of the Nationalist Congress Party, for his disclosure that Union home minister Amit Shah, Devendra Fadnavis, Sharad Pawar, Praful Patel, himself and Gautam Adani were present at a meeting at the latter's house in 2019 when it was decided to form the government with Fadnavis as the CM and Pawar Jr as his deputy.
In a hush-hush development the then governor Bhagat Singh Koshiyari was woken up from bed and asked to swear-in Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar. Only a handful of people were present at the Raj Bhavan. This government lasted for exactly three days, the shortest in the history of any state.
By disclosing that the closed door meeting was held at Adani's residence Ajit Pawar appears to have deliberately embarrassed the BJP which has for long been accused by the opposition of being influenced by Adani.
Incidentally, Fadnavis himself had several months ago disclosed that Sharad Pawar was very much in the loop when it was decided to form a government headed by Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar. At that time Sharad Pawar had accused Fadnavis of being a ``liar." In retrospect, Fadnavis has been found to have spoken the truth.
Now his own nephew has revealed that he (Sharad Pawar) was very much in the thick of discussions to form a BJP-NCP government. This has placed tremendous strain on the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi also since Sharad Pawar, who is known for his close proximity to Adani, is its "bishmapitamaha."
It is well known that ties between the BJP and Ajit Pawar has been ebbing following differences over allocation of seats for the November 20 assembly elections. For example, despite warnings from the BJP, Ajit Pawar decided to give a ticket to Nawab Malik, former minister whom the BJP is accusing of having links with international terrorist Dawood Ibrahim, to contest the poll from Mankhurd-Shivaji Nagar. Ajit Pawar went further by fielding Nawab Malik's daughter, Sana, from Anushakti Nagar which was earlier represented by Nawab Malik.
For the past several months, cadres of the Sangh Parivar have been openly critical of Ajit Pawar. On July 18, senior RSS idealogue Ratan Sharda had told the FPJ that the BJP's joining hands with Ajit Pawar was a wrong decision. Later two journals of the RSS, Organiser and Vivek, too had come down heavily on Ajit Pawar, who was earlier accused by the BJP of being involved in a Rs 70,000 crore irrigation scam.
PM Modi himself had levelled this grave allegation against Ajit Pawar. The latter has been smarting under this wave of criticism from the saffron family all these months and on the eve of the assembly polls decided to hit back by disclosing about the secret meeting at Adani's apartment.
Sources said irrespective of the outcome of the assembly polls, Ajit Pawar will not be a part of any effort by the BJP to form the next government. Instead of being a political asset, Ajit Pawar has proven to be a big liability and the BJP would like to jettison him as soon as possible.
