Sharad had quit as NCP chief after rebels clamoured to join BJP: Supriya Sule

PUNE: In a major revelation, NCP Working President and MP Supriya Sule said that her father, Sharad Pawar had quit as NCP President on May 2 as some people were clamoring to ally with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, here on Thursday.

She also asserted that her father was kept ‘in the dark’ about the moves by her cousin, the rival NCP President Ajit Pawar to join hands with the BJP -- both in November 2019 and in July 2023.

“Sharad Pawar never had any plan to resign as NCP chief, but he was compelled to do so after the rebel group led by Ajit Pawar were insistent on supporting the BJP. He was very pained by their decision,” declared Sule, a 3-time MP from Baramati.

In a dramatic turn, Sharad Pawar had quit as NCP President on May 2, and after the party’s pressures, had taken it back on May 5, while Ajit Pawar and his supporters left the party on July 1 to ally with the ruling Shiv Sena of Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and BJP.

Responding to this in Akola, Sharad Pawar declared that contrary to speculation, he never had any intentions to go with the BJP, as claimed by some leaders of the breakaway NCP faction and BJP.

Referring to NCP (AP) faction’s Minister Chhagan Bhujbal’s claims to a private TV channel, Sule said that it is now evident by Bhujbal’s own statements that Sharad Pawar was unaware of either the dawn swearing-in ceremony of November 2019, or the July 2023 split.

Now, in his recent remarks, she said Bhujbal has admitted that both the oath-taking ceremonies (November 2019 and July 2023) were done without keeping Sharad Pawar in the loop, and he had even ‘lied’ on his own whereabouts during the July 2023 episode.

Sule reiterated that Sharad Pawar has never jettisoned the Congress ideology and followed his mentor, the first CM of Maharashtra, Y. B. Chavan, and he made it clear to Bhujbal and other rebels that they are free to go to the BJP as he would not abandon his ideological stance.

Sule even rubbished Bhujbal’s claim that after Sharad Pawar’s resignation, she was to be made the NCP President and then allying with the BJP, and said she would “never ever have compromised with her father’s ideals, and so refused to be the NCP chief”.

She even attacked the BJP’s hypocrisy for first dubbing the NCP as a ‘nationally corrupt party’, later claiming to hold secret talks with the same NCP, and then allying with it for political gains, and demanded that “the BJP must apologise for all their false allegations hurled against us for so long”.