Stressing that that she had come to strengthen the BJP in the Baramati Lok Sabha constituency in Pune district, Union Finance Minister and senior party leader Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday clarified that the purpose of her three-day visit to Baramati, considered the bastion of the Pawar clan, was not to talk about any one family.
Ms. Sitharaman’s Baramati tour is part of the BJP’s Pravas campaign to shore up its base in 144 Lok Sabha constituencies across the country (where the saffron party is weak) ahead of the 2024 general election.
Sixteen of the 144 LS constituencies are in Maharashtra of which Baramati, hitherto the impregnable bastion of the Pawar clan and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), is a prime target for the BJP.