Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar, taking aim at the rebel faction led by his nephew Ajit Pawar, on Sunday rubbished their claim that they had aligned with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to ensure Maharashtra’s development. He remarked they had defected fearing investigation by Central agencies.
Mr. Pawar was addressing his party workers at Pune, as part of a Statewide tour to rebuild his party following the split engineered by his nephew last month.
“Some of our colleagues, who have changed their party, claim they went there [to the BJP] for the sake of Maharashtra’s development. This is nonsense. Most of those who defected were facing an Enforcement Directorate (ED) probe launched by the [BJP-led] Central government and were not ready to face that probe,” he said.
