In another major setback to the Ajit Pawar-led NCP in the run-up to the October 2024 Maharashtra Assembly polls, its senior leader from Parbhani and former MLC Abdullah Babajani Khan Durrani returned to the Opposition NCP and parent party headed by Sharad Pawar on Saturday.
Revealing that he was feeling “awkward” to continue in the NCP (Ajit Pawar), a constituent of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led MahaYuti because of his “ideological differences” with the BJP, Babajani Durrani -- Abdullah Babajani Khan Durrani is popularly known --joined the NCP (SP) in the presence of Sharad Pawar at a function held in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar (erstwhile Aurangabad).
Babajani Durrani’s return to the NCP comes a week after the NCP (Ajit Pawar)’s Pimpri unit chief Ajit Gavahane and three other leaders quit the party and joined the rival NCP (Sharad Pawar).
Speaking at the function where he was welcomed into the parent party which he had quit after a vertical split in the united NCP engineered by Ajit Pawar on July 2, 2023, Babajani Durrani said: “Two the split in the NCP, I had joined the Ajit Pawar-led party due to some reasons and also the advice I had received from some people. I have not betrayed Sharad Pawar ji. I have been with him since 1980. At a time when the party set up in 1999 was growing, I had ensured the victory of several municipal councilors in the municipal councils of Pathri, Parthur and Osmanabad in Marathwada”.
“Parbhani is a stronghold of NCP. When the party split in July last year, I stayed with the Sharad Pawar-led group for the first two months.
However, after that, for some inexplicable reasons and the advice I received, I joined the Ajit Pawar-led NCP,” Babajani Durrani said.
“The Muslim minority community is under tremendous stress in my region.
Muslims are disenchanted with the parties that are in alliance with the BJP. Under such circumstances it was awkward for me to continue with such a party (Ajit Pawar-led NCO) any longer, hence I am joining the NCP (SP),”
Durrani’s entry to the NCP(SP) came a day after his son Junaid met State NCP (Sharad Pawar faction) state chief Jayant Patil and conveyed his father’s desire to join the Sharad Pawar-led party and sought ticket for his father to contest from the Pathri Assembly constituency, which is part of the Parbhani Lok Sabha constituency
An ex-MLA and two-time MLC who has long keen to contest the State Assembly polls, Durrani is likely to be fielded as a candidate from Pathri. His term as an MLC ended on Saturday.