02 July,2023 10:38 PM IST | New Delhi | PTI
Ajit Pawar and other state ministers after taking oath on Sunday. Pic/Shadab Khan
In a swipe at opposition parties, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) asked if their efforts to forge unity in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha polls were "completely disturbed" after Ajit Pawar and eight other NCP MLAs joined the Eknath Shinde-led Maharashtra government on Sunday.
"PDA - Poora (completely) Disturbed Alliance?" BJP national spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla tweeted in a swipe at the opposition leaders' attempt at forming an alliance to take on the BJP in 2024.
Those who cannot keep their parties and leaders united are trying to forge opposition unity "from Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Karnataka to Bihar", Poonawalla charged and added, "Gehlot, Pilot, DKS, Siddaramaiah, Manjhi...first unite them!"
After over a dozen prominent opposition parties resolved to take on the BJP unitedly in the 2024 assembly polls at their meeting in Patna last month, some reports claimed that their proposed coalition could be called "Patriotic Democratic Alliance" (PDA).
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Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and his former deputy Sachin Pilot have been at loggerheads ever since the Congress came to power in the state in 2018.
In Bihar, the Hindustan Awam Morcha (HAM) led by Jitan Ram Manjhi recently severed ties with the state's ruling alliance led by the JD(U) and the RJD.
In Karnataka, where the Congress won the recent assembly polls, D K Shivakumar, popularly called DKS, and Siddaramaiah were engaged in a tussle for the post of chief minister before the party found a solution. Siddaramaiah took oath as chief minister and Shivakumar as his deputy.
In a surprise development in Maharashtra, Ajit Pawar was sworn in as the deputy chief minister and the eight other NCP leaders as ministers.
Those who were sworn in as ministers are Chhagan Bhujbal, Dilip Walse Patil, Hasan Mushrif, Dhananjay Munde, Aditi Tatkare, Dharmarao Atram, Anil Patil and Sanjay Bansode.
After taking oath, Ajit Pawar said his party decided to join the Eknath Shinde-led government in the interest of the state and the country, and praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership.
Maintaining that there was no split in the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), Pawar said all the elected representatives of the party have supported the decision to join the government, and that they would contest all the future elections on the NCP's name and symbol.
Referring to a letter submitted to the Raj Bhavan, sources though claimed that Pawar has the support of more than 40 MLAs and over six MLCs of NCP.
The NCP has a total of 53 MLAs and nine MLCs in Maharashtra.
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