Ajit Pawar (L) is NCP founder Sharad Pawar’s nephew (File).
Mumbai:
Maharashtra Speaker Rahul Narwekar on Thursday cited last week’s Election Commission order – recognising Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar as the leader of the ‘real Nationalist Congress Party‘ – to reject petitions seeking disqualification of 41 MLAs who rebelled against Sharad Pawar in June last year, triggering a split and a battle for control of the NCP.
Mr Narwekar said the MLAs who joined Ajit Pawar in rebelling against his uncle – and allied with the BJP and a similar breakaway faction of the Shiv Sena – to form a new state government, could not be disqualified as they constituted the “will of the party”.
“I hold that (the) Ajit Pawar-led NCP is the real political party. Ajit Pawar has the legislative majority with 41 MLAs. This is undisputed,” he said, “All petitions seeking disqualification of are rejected.”
The Supreme Court last month gave Mr Narwekar till February 15 to decide on disqualification petitions against MLAs affiliated to Ajit Pawar’s group.
Before the split the NCP had 53 MLAs.
After the dust settled, 41 of them sided with Ajit Pawar, leaving only 12 with Sharad Pawar as he tried to re-assert control over the party he helped found in 1999, and has since led.
Last week the Election Commission said the Ajit Pawar faction would be recognised as the ‘real NCP’, thereby giving it control over the party name and symbol (a clock) weeks before the Lok Sabha election and polls to fill six to-be-vacant Rajya Sabha seats in the state.
READ | Ajit Pawar’s Faction Named Real NCP In Setback For Sharad Pawar
The poll panel gave Sharad Pawar mere hours to decide on a new name, and his faction was eventually renamed as the Nationalist Congress Party Sharadchandra Pawar.
READ | Sharad Pawar’s Party Assigned New Name By Election Commission
Sources said the Commission’s decision was based on the numerical strength of the two factions, something Mr Narwekar referred to, and relied on, in this instance too.
A furious NCP called the Election Commission’s actions “murder of democracy”.
“The whole world knows who founded the NCP. So what the Election Commission did, despite that, is the murder of democracy…” Anil Desmukh, a former Minister, said.
Sharad Pawar’s camp has approached the Supreme Court over the EC order.
The decision played out like the Sena vs Sena fight, in which the faction led by Eknath Shinde (made Chief Minister after rebelling and allying with the BJP) was called the ‘real Sena’, leaving Uddhav Thackeray racing, weeks before an election, to find a new identity for the party his father founded.
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