Sharad Pawar slams BJP: NCP president Sharad Pawar on Saturday (July 8) said that the BJP seems to have plans to ‘destroy’ the state-level parties and attempt to weaken the Opposition.
Pawar has hit the road in a bid to rally his party workers behind him, days after his nephew Ajit Pawar switched sides to join the Maharashtra government along with eight other MLAs.
Speaking to the reporters here, the NCP chief said that he was witnessed politics of former prime ministers Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and P V Narasimha Rao, all of whom spoke (critically) about opposition parties but never sought to silence the Opposition.
"It appears that the BJP has plans to destroy state-level parties. They have done this in different places. In electoral democracy, the opposition party is as important as the ruling party. But the BJP's policy is to weaken the Opposition,” he said.
“The BJP knows what is in store for it and hence it is splitting up other parties to ensure a majority in the Lok Sabha in 2024,” he added.
'Detrimental to democracy'
He called the move ‘detrimental’ to the electoral democracy.
Pawar said that he does not consider those with differences of opinion his enemies.
“Difference of opinion does not mean enmity,” he said.
Sharad Pawar said PM Narendra Modi has spoken of massive corruption by NCP leaders, so he should punish those guilty.
“PM Modi has all the state machinery at his disposal. He should act against these leaders and punish them,” Pawar said.
While addressing the BJP booth workers in Bhopal, PM Modi accused the Nationalist Congress Party of being involved in corruption worth Rs 70,000 crore.
(With PTI inputs)
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