The Ajit Pawar faction is the real Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), the Election Commission announced on Tuesday, ending months of speculation over the factional fight with his party founder and uncle Sharad Pawar.
He furnished an undertaking before a bench of Justices Surya Kant and KV Viswanathan pursuant to a March 14 order by the apex court.
Television visuals showed BJP workers mobbing the car at Khandoji Baba Chowk and vandalising it, resulting in the vehicle's windscreen and side panes getting damaged.
Days before the first vote for the Lok Sabha polls is cast, the Supreme Court on Thursday asked the rival Nationalist Congress Party factions led by party founder Sharad Pawar and Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar to abide by its directions on the use of symbols, party names and disclaimers in publicity material for the elections.
The Bharatiya Janata Party and the Shiv Sena were on Sunday trying to make last ditch efforts to salvage their alliance in Maharashtra for the upcoming Assembly polls after the Uddhav Thackeray's final offer of giving 119 seats to the coalition partner was rejected.
'It is inappropriate to level allegations against your own colleagues after they leave you'
It asked the Maharashtra deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar-led faction to issue a public notice in newspapers in English, Hindi and Marathi saying that the 'clock' symbol is sub-judice and its use is subject to adjudication.
I think Sharad Pawar invited Ajit Pawar for the INDIA bloc meeting, Raut said.
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Monday said he does not see any other strong leader like Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the national level today.
The bench gave liberty to Sharad Pawar to move the poll panel for allocation of the party symbol and directed the poll panel to allot it in one week of the application.
Azmi has slammed the Maharashtra government for atrocities against minorities.
'We cannot accept Ajir Pawar if he comes to join us as a member of the NCP.' 'NCP is not welcome to us.'
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will chair a meeting of the Union Council of Ministers on Monday amid a heightened buzz about the likelihood of a Cabinet reshuffle following a series of meetings of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party's top brass.
Taking potshots at the Bharatiya Janata Party, some opposition leaders also wondered if Goel resigned to contest the Lok Sabha polls on its ticket like former Calcutta high court judge Abhijit Gangopadhyay.
Two days before rebelling against uncle Sharad Pawar and joining the Maharashtra government last Sunday, Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar approached the Election Commission on June 30 staking claim to the party name as well as symbol and subsequently also declared himself as president with the support of 40 lawmakers, sources said.
Describing the Bharatiya Janata Party's stand on separate statehood for Vidarbha akin to "protectors becoming perpetrators", the Shiv Sena on Wednesday reminded its former ally of the resounding mandate it got in Vidarbha and said the vote was in favour of development and not for a separate statehood.
The 25-year-old Bharatiya Janata Party-Shiv Sena alliance split on Thursday amid continued deadlock over seat-sharing for the October 15 Maharashtra assembly polls.
In a surprise development on July 2, the Sharad Pawar-led NCP split as his nephew Ajit Pawar and almost three dozen MLAs joined the ruling Shiv Sena-BJP alliance. Ajit Pawar and eight other NCP leaders were sworn in as ministers.
'Neither did I approach the BJP nor did they ask me to join them. It was a natural choice for both of us to make.' 'It was never for me to ask or for them to give.'
NCP leader Ajit Pawar on Saturday received a grand welcome in Baramati, which is his assembly constituency and also the pocket borough of party chief Sharad Pawar, on his first visit after joining the Bharatiya Janata Party-Shiv Sena government in Maharashtra and parting ways with his uncle.
Mamata asserted that she has not spoken to anyone in the Congress on seat-sharing in the state for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde said on Thursday that spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar had given him blessings and told him that he would succeed when he and other rebel Shiv Sena MLAs were camping in a Guwahati hotel.
The Nationalist Congress Party, the main opposition outfit, accused the neighbouring state, ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party, of 'snatching morsel from Maharashtra's mouth.'
This is just another instance of the indifference with which the Commission has been treated by the government.
On Friday, Shrikant Shinde had said some leaders were trying to create hurdles in the alliance in Dombivali area (under Kalyan Lok Sabha seat) for their own selfish politics and that he was ready to leave the seat since the aim was to ensure the Narendra Modi government returns with a thumping majority in the 2024 LS polls.
Pawar, who was also the deputy CM in the previous Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government, which was in power from November 2019 to June 2022, enjoys the image of a grassroot leader and an able administrator.
Any move of the present government to appease the Marathas may boomerang. Eknath Shinde is a worried man with the agitation not having an easy solution, notes Ramesh Menon.
Thackeray also slammed the "Owaisi brothers" (AIMIM leaders) for allegedly ridiculing the names of Hindu gods.
Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar was given the finance and planning portfolio on Friday, nearly two weeks after he broke away from the original party and took oath as Maharashtra's deputy chief minister.
Scores of protesting Kashmiri Pandit prime minister's package employees on Monday reiterated their demand for relocation outside the valley, saying their worst fears have come true with the latest killing of a community member in Pulwama.
Asked if the investigation by the Enforcement Directorate prompted some NCP leaders to join the BJP-Shiv Sena government, Pawar said he didn't have any information regarding this.
Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar, who took oath as the deputy chief minister of Maharashtra, on Sunday said his party decided to become part of the Eknath Shinde government for the development of the country, and praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership.
Notably, after coming to power in November 2019, the then MVA government scrapped certain policy decisions of its predecessor BJP-Shiv Sena government led by Fadnavis.
Social activist Anna Hazare on Monday said the proposed Lokayukta Act in Maharashtra on the lines of the Centre's Lokpal legislation will be a "revolutionary" tool to fight against corruption.
A family priest performed the prayers as per Parsi tradition before the last rites.
The advertisement carries Sena's bow-and-arrow symbol and images of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and CM Shinde. It has no image or photo of Shiv Sena founder late Balasaheb Thackeray, a noticeable departure going by its earlier publicity materials.
The biggest shocker is in Haryana where at least three exit polls predicted decimation of the Opposition, but the BJP won 40 seats in the 90-member assembly and the Congress 31 seats.
'They want to win 45 out of 48 seats in Maharashtra in the 2024 general elections and joining hands with Ajit Pawar is in that direction.'
'Switching loyalty from one party to another is completely unfair as it devalues my vote.'
Marking a vertical split in the Nationalist Congress Party, its senior leader Ajit Pawar joined the Eknath Shinde-led Maharashtra government as deputy chief minister on Sunday.
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