ationalist Congress Party (NCP) working president and MP Supriya Sule hit out at her cousin brother and breakaway faction leader Ajit Pawar for taking a dig at Sharad Pawar’s advanced age and suggesting that it was time for Sr Pawar to retire.
“My father is a fighter. I am proud of my father. You may say anything about anyone else but not against my father and mother,” Supriya warned Ajit at a meeting called by the Sharad Pawar faction at the YB Chavan Centre in south Mumbai.
Earlier during the day, at a gathering of his faction’s MLAs and supporters, Ajit Pawar said, “Sharad Pawar is my idol. But you tell me, isn’t it true that if a person joins the Maharashtra Government, he retires at the age of 58? If they are IAS, IPS, etc., they retire at the age of 60...If you are in politics, you retire at the age of 75 in the BJP. Murli Manohar Joshi and LK Advani are such examples... Now, if you’re 82 or 83, are you ever going to stop or retire? In terms of age, we want you to be a centenarian.”
Maintaining that Sr Pawar was still strong and he could still many political battles, Supriya cited the examples of industrialist Ratan Tata, 85, who is guiding the fortunes of the Tata empire, Amitabh Bachchan, 82, still the highest-rated superstar, former Jammu & Kashmir Farooque Abdullah, 85, to prove her point that her father could carry on for many years in politics.
The NCP working president charged that the BJP was “the most corrupt party in India’.
Referring to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s comment that the NCP stood for “Naturally Corrupt Party”, Supriya said that the same BJP leaders who had loftily claimed “na khaunga, na khane dunga” had joined hands with the Naturally Corrupt Party (faction) of Ajit Pawar and have swallowed all its corruption.