Mumbai: Refuting talks of her joining another party, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national secretary Pankaja Munde Friday asserted that if there are any questions about why she is overlooked for opportunities, they should be directed at the party.
“Every time there is an appointment of someone and my name doesn’t come up, there is a discussion that I am disgruntled. This discussion is not because of me. So instead of asking me about it, the party should talk about it, and not me. When the party feels I am eligible, it will give me a chance,” Munde said at a press conference at her residence.
Friday’s press conference was prompted by news reports of Munde being in talks to join the Congress.
Since 2019, after Munde lost to cousin and NCP leader Dhananjay Munde in the Maharashtra election, there have been talks of a growing rift between Munde — a former MLA from Parli in Beed district — and the BJP leadership, especially at the state level.
In 2013, Dhananjay had walked out of the BJP after it was clear that his uncle and late BJP stalwart Gopinath Munde intended to pass on his political legacy to his daughters — Pritam and Pankaja. Dhananjay then joined the NCP. Pritam is the BJP MP from Beed.
On Sunday, when the Ajit Pawar-led NCP faction joined the Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis government, Dhananjay became a cabinet minister.
On Friday, Munde said she intends to take a two-month vacation from “this brand of politics” and requested media persons to not approach her for that duration.
“I want to take a break and think for one or two months where the country’s politics is headed. We need to think about what is happening to people. I am saying two months break so that you don’t come with a microphone to me and ask me for a reaction on what someone has said,” the former Maharashtra minister said.
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‘Why are questions being raised on my ethics?’
Since 2019, there have been talks on whether the BJP would accommodate her as an MLC in the state legislature.
The party had asked her to keep her nomination papers ready for the MLC elections on two occasions, but was eventually not given the go ahead, she said.
“I have obeyed every decision of the party. Then, why are questions being raised on my ethics? My nature is such that I am transparent and I like straight talk. I have always taken a clear stand in politics,” Munde said, adding if she were to take any action it would be ‘danke ki chot par‘ (to tell everyone openly about it).
In an indirect reference to the splits in the Shiv Sena and the NCP, Munde said that while Maharashtra is seeing different political experiments, party workers like her are working to ensure that the BJP’s ideology of Deendayal Upadhyay and Atal Bihari Vajpayee is preserved.
Munde said, earlier this week, she also met her cousin Dhananjay at her residence when he came to visit her and congratulated him for being appointed a cabinet minister.
On Friday morning, Dhananjay tweeted pictures and a video of Pankaja Munde presenting him with a bouquet, feeding him sweets and putting a teeka (vermillion) on his forehead.
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Overlooked by party
The first sign of Munde’s unease within the BJP was in 2016 when the then CM Devendra Fadnavis took away the portfolio of water conservation portfolio under which his flagship project Jal Yukta Shivar was constituted.
Since 2019, Munde has often made statements indicating her disillusionment with the party.
After she lost the 2019 state polls, Munde had said that the media keeps discussing talks of her quitting the BJP. In a veiled taunt at Fadnavis, she had said that it was being “deliberately done by some people” to ensure that she doesn’t get any party post.
Munde’s supposed disenchantment with the party has often been in talks every time she or her sister were overlooked for a position — during the MLC elections in 2020 and 2022 when she did not get a nomination, or during the cabinet expansion in 2021, when the BJP leadership picked Bhagwat Karad as a junior minister and OBC face over Pritam.
The Munde sisters belong to the OBC’s Vanjari community with their father being an icon for the community in Maharashtra.
(Edited by Anumeha Saxena)
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