Mumbai, Apr 21 (PTI) Nationalist Congress Party leader Amol Mitkari on Monday said workers of the Ajit Pawar-led party and NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) would be overjoyed if both leaders came together, even as he rejected the talk of political agenda behind the meetings between them.
Mitkari’s reaction comes after Sharad Pawar and Ajit Pawar shared the stage at a meeting in Sakhar Sankul (Sugar Complex) in Pune. The uncle-nephew duo had met on two occasions in a fortnight.
The latest meeting was attended by officials from the Vasantdada Sugar Institute.
After the meeting, Ajit Pawar clarified that he and the senior Pawar discussed Artificial Intelligence (AI) in agriculture and the sugar industry.
Playing down the hype over the meetings, Mitkari said the Pawars are members of several education and cooperative institutions.
“Both leaders have a development vision for Maharashtra. There is no need to see a political motive behind the meeting,” Mitkari told a Marathi news channel in Akola.
He further said workers of NCP and NCP (SP) would be overjoyed if both leaders came together.
“We all respect saheb (Sharad Pawar). He is a senior leader with over 50 years of experience. He meets several political leaders. Some people feel both parties shouldn’t come together. But if it (coming together) happens, it would be great,” the NCP MLC said.
When asked about his third meeting with senior Pawar in recent weeks, beginning with the engagement of his son Jay, Ajit had downplayed the political significance of these meetings, saying families come together on occasions like engagements, and there was no need to interpret them from any other perspective.
Relations between Sharad and Ajit Pawar strained after the latter engineered a split in NCP in July 2023 and joined the Mahayuti government. Several MLAs of NCP joined the Ajit Pawar camp, leaving the Pawar senior to battle the biggest political crisis of his life.
In the 2024 Maharashtra assembly polls, Ajit-led NCP bagged 41 of the 57 seats it contested, decimating the NCP (SP) faction’s tally to 10. PTI MR NSK
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