Leader of Opposition in the assembly Devendra Fadnavis was also scheduled to attend the events in Kothrud, Vadgaonsheri and other places, but he announced cancellation of the Pune tour on Saturday evening after the police called him for questioning on Sunday at the BKC cyber police station in Mumbai, as a part of the police probe into the phone tapping case. (See )
Ajit Pawar will attend 31 events, including inauguration, ground breaking of projects in Sus, Dhankawdi, Katraj, Tingrenagar, Wanowrie, while Fadanvis was to inaugurate the Nal Stop flyover.
BJP functionaries in the city said they plan to go ahead with the inauguration of the projects in the absence of Fadnavis. Mayor Muralidhar Mohol, keen on Fadnavis’s presence at the inauguration of the Nal Stop flyover, said calling the former chief minister for the questioning was a part of “revenge politics” of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government.
Mohol said, “We are planning to go ahead with the inauguration. After all, the facilities are for common citizens. We shall finalize the inauguration plan by Sunday afternoon. The party’s state president, Chandrakant Patil, is likely to remain present. We are checking his schedule,” Mohol said.
BJP’s city unit president Jagdish Mulik said the MVA government’s attempt to suppress the voice of BJP leaders by issuing notices will not succeed. “Fadnavis was scheduled to attend an event to inaugurate a status of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj in Vadgaonsheri on Sunday. Since he is unlikely to visit the city we are planning to go ahead with the inaugurations. Though the MVA government will attempt to obstruct us from doing good work, the BJP shall continue with the developmental works,” Mulik added.
Fadnavis, who was then chief minister, was the face of the civic polls in Pune in 2017. He steered the campaign and clinched a historic win for the his party by defeating the NCP. The BJP sent over 98 corporators to the civic body by pushing NCP’s tally below 50.
The NCP, however, is now keen on regaining the civic body in the forthcoming elections under the leadership of Ajit Pawar. The NCP camp is expecting a turnaround especially after the party won two assembly seats (Vadgaonsheri and Hadapsar) in 2019 state polls and lost a third seat (Khadakwasla) by marginal votes. “Pawar will begin his tour early in the morning at 7am from Sus and his last event is at 8pm at Tingrenagar. Over 31 visits and programmes are scheduled all through the day. It will be a busy day for our leader, as he will be covering many areas and civic wards,” said NCP spokesperson Pradeep Deshmukh.
Prashant Jagtap, the NCP’s city unit chief, said it would not be appropriate to say that inaugurations at the hands of Pawar have been planned ahead of the elections. “The corporators are working on these projects for the last two to three years. There were restrictions because of the Covid-19 pandemic. We were able to deliver the projects despite lesser funds allotted to the NCP corporators by the BJP-ruled civic body,” Jagtap said.