Some people from Ajit Pawar’s party were stopping him from uniting NCP factions: Sanjay Raut

It is unlikely that Sharad Pawar will ally with the BJP in the event of a merger of the two NCP groups, Raut claimed.

Mumbai: Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut on Sunday claimed that some people from late Maharashtra deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar’s party were stopping him from uniting the two factions of the NCP, as it would have “shut their shops”.

Talking to reporters in New Delhi, Raut said Ajit Pawar had taken the lead in uniting his NCP (Nationalist Congress Party) and the NCP (SP), led by his uncle Sharad Pawar, and that several meetings had been held for this purpose.

Raut said Ajit Pawar, who died in a plane crash in Baramati near Pune on Wednesday, had faith in Sharad Pawar till the very last.

It is unlikely that Sharad Pawar will ally with the BJP in the event of a merger of the two NCP groups, he further claimed.

“Some people from Ajit Pawar’s party were stopping him from uniting the two factions of the NCP as it would have shut their shops,” Raut said.

NCP is a party of “Patils” (Marathis), and Deputy Chief Minister Sunetra Pawar must ensure that its leadership does not go to “Patels”, he said, in an apparent reference to NCP’s working president Praful Patel.

Earlier, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray had also made a similar pitch, saying that the president of a "truly Marathi party" like the NCP should be “a Patil and not a Patel”.

Raut alleged that the BJP leadership in Delhi does not want Marathi minds and leaders to come together as it “wants to divide and rule”.

Whether it is the NCP or the Shiv Sena, headed by Deputy CM Eknath Shinde, the levers of control of both parties rest with the BJP, the Sena (UBT) leader claimed further.

In a veiled reference to the swearing-in of Sunetra Pawar as deputy CM just days after her husband Ajit Pawar’s death, Raut posted an old video of the late leader.

In the video, Ajit Pawar was referring to the buzz around the bypoll after the demise of Pune MP Girish Bapat in 2023. “If any such thing (death) happens in one’s family, people wait for 13 days (till the mourning period is over),” he had said in the purported video. The Pune bypoll did not take place.

Sharad Pawar had claimed on Saturday that Ajit Pawar had finalised February 12 to announce the “merger” between the NCP factions, adding that the process might face a roadblock due to the latter’s sudden demise.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis appeared to question Sharad Pawar's claim, asserting that if that was the case, Ajit Pawar would have shared the details with him.