A day after Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray’s vitriolic assault on the ruling Shiv Sena and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), NCP chief Sharad Pawar took jibes at Mr. Thackeray, remarking there was no consistency in his political disposition while slamming the MNS leader’s allegations of the NCP being a “casteist party”.
Speaking in Kolhapur, Mr. Pawar said that the NCP was one of the few political parties in the country with a vision to give opportunities to people of all castes, communities and tribes.
In his speech on the occasion of Gudi Padwa on Saturday, the MNS chief had sharply rebuked the NCP before a jam-packed audience at Mumbai’s Shivaji Park for allegedly sowing the seeds of caste politics in Maharashtra while accusing Mr. Pawar’s party of “running rings around” the two leading parties in the State, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Shiv Sena, led by his [Mr. Raj Thackeray’s] estranged cousin, Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray.
