Mumbai:
Ajit Pawar's resignation as Deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra has exposed two problems - first up, the hostility between his party, the NCP, and the chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, who belongs to the Congress. Together, the parties have governed the state together for over a decade. Then there's the apparent tug of war for power within the NCP between Ajit Pawar and his uncle, Sharad, who is the chief of the party and Union Minister for Agriculture. 13 Independent MLAs have now threatened to rethink support to the state government is Mr Pawar is allowed to quit.
Here are the top 10 developments in this story:
Senior leaders of the NCP will meet in Mumbai today to discuss Mr Pawar's resignation, which inspired the party's 19 other ministers to also quit, though their resignation letters are seen more as posturing because they were sent to a party leader and not to the chief minister.
Ajit Pawar says his decision to quit comes after months of persecution by the opposition and the media which holds him responsible for irregularities worth thousands of crores during his earlier decade-long term as Water Resources Minister.
But sources say that his resignation carries important messages for the Congress - that NCP ministers are frustrated with chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, and that the cabinet reshuffle in Delhi, expected in the next few days, should give the NCP its due.
Sharad Pawar has said that the coalition government in Maharashtra -or his party's membership of Dr Manmohan Singh's government in Delhi - will not be undermined by his nephew's resignation, which he said he supports and has sanctioned.
RTI activists allege that as Irrigation Minister from 1999 to 2009, Ajit Pawar used his office to engineer a massive swindle. Along with the opposition BJP, they allege that he sanctioned inflated contracts to private companies in return for kickbacks. To enable this, he allegedly changed the rules which gave him huge control in deciding which firms would be hired, and over-ruled senior bureaucrats who objected. They also say that the costs of irrigation projects doubled from about 35,000 crores to 70,000 crores.
What has upset the NCP is the chief minister's decision that a white paper or financial statement on these projects and deals must be shared with the Assembly. The NCP wants Ajit Pawar's years in office to be exempt. The Irrigation Department has been managed by the NCP even after Ajit Pawar became deputy chief minister.
RTI activists, the BJP and reportedly the state government's own Agriculture Department say that after thousands of crores were spent on Ajit Pawar's watch, a mere 0.1% additional land was irrigated. The NCP says that's incorrect- that costs shot up because of inflation and that and extra 0.5% land was serviced by the new projects.
The conflict between the NCP and the Congress is also obvious in the fact that the Irrigation department, led by Ajit Pawar's party, supports his claims, while the Agriculture Department managed by the Congress appears to agree with the opposition's allegations.
Sources close to chief minister Prithviraj Chavan say that he believes Ajit Pawar had been plotting his resignation drama for a few weeks and had been refusing to take Mr Chavan's phone calls. He opted out of a trip to Delhi with the chief minister on Monday. Mr Chavan then met with Sharad Pawar in Delhi, who reportedly expressed his party's concern over what it perceived as Mr Chavan's support of the accusations against Ajit Pawar.
Mr Chavan allegedly told the NCP chief that it is hard to conceal information in an era when the Right to Information Act allows ordinary citizens to demand access to government documents.
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