Mumbai: People are in the mood for a change in Maharashtra and the scrapping of Article 370, raised aggressively by the BJP, does not seem to be resonating with the masses at grass-root level in the state, NCP chief Sharad Pawar claimed, Thursday.
In an interview to this agency, Pawar accused the NDA government of misusing power to bedevil political opponents, after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) named him and summoned senior NCP leader Praful Patel in separate money-laundering cases. With the Maharashtra elections around, Sharad Pawar also impugned the timing of the move.
The NCP patriarch said his party will strive to ensure the leaders who crossed over to the ruling BJP or Shiv Sena taste defeat in the October 21 Assembly polls. “The people are in the mood for a change in Maharashtra,” Pawar asserted.
The BJP benefited in the Lok Sabha elections, held earlier this year, from the sentiment that developed among people after the Pulwama terror attack (in February), the former Defence Minister said. He also pointed out that Prime Minister Narendra Modi also largely campaigned on the lines of Pulwama issue.
“People normally consolidate when there is a national calamity. We had seen it during the India-Pakistan war (that led to creation of Bangladesh in 1971),” Pawar said.
“So, naturally people made a one-sided decision (post-Pulwama) and Modi got more than 300 seats. But, this one is a state (Assembly) election,” the 79-year-old leader added.
Pawar asserted that people vote differently in the Lok Sabha and Assembly polls, citing examples of what happened in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh in a short span (last year). He pointed out that people of the three states favoured Modi in the Lok Sabha polls, but voted against the BJP in the Assembly elections held there few months earlier.
“I see such a change happening (the BJP losing) in Maharashtra (Assembly polls),” the former Defence Minister said, exuding confidence.
Pawar stated that despite top BJP leaders raising the issue of abrogation of Article 370 in the Maharashtra poll campaign, he could not see it resonating with the common people at the grass-root level.
“Since Article 370 has been removed, one can go and buy land in Kashmir which was not possible earlier. When I ask people will they go to Kashmir and do farming, none says yes. So, it is not that scrapping of Article 370 will have a bearing on the State Assembly polls, Pawar pointed out.
PTI