Ajit Pawar is very flexible, says Devendra Fadnavis amid civic poll push

Mumbai: Amid hectic campaigning for the upcoming civic polls, including the Mumbai Municipal Corporation, chief minister Devendra Fadnavis spoke to the Times of India group journalists about his party's vision to give Mumbai transparent governance, the squabbles within Shiv Sena and NCP and how parties are finding it hard to escape the promise of freebies.

On the verbal skirmishes with Ajit Pawar-led NCP, Fadnavis said: "We have thoroughly and carefully chosen to have an alliance with him (Ajit Pawar). Certain statements are made during elections. Ajit Pawar is a man who understands politics. He knows when to go back and when to go forward. He is very flexible."

On the tussle between Shiv Sena and BJP in Ambernath where the latter initially decided to ally with Congress to keep the Shiv Sena away from power, Fadnavis said: It was wrong not to ally with Shiv Sena. What happened in Ambernath is that leaders of both of our local party leaders had a big enmity with each other and hence the local leadership took that step. You cannot bring people artificially."


Despite the acerbic statements exchanged by NCP, BJP and Shiv Sena at the local level, Fadnavis said the alliance was strong for 2029 and beyond and that they had agreed to fight separately in some local bodies to ensure that they do not concede space to the Opposition. Fadnavis said BJP will come to power in the Pune and Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation on its own but hinted that they would not be averse to joining hands with NCP in these civic bodies.

Fadnavis' assertion was significant as it could give a backdoor entry to Sharad Pawar-led NCP (SP) to join NDA as it is in alliance with NCP in these two civic bodies.

He justified joining hands with NCP which it was opposed to earlier, saying the party had suffered when it simply stood by its principles. "To implement our policies, we need power. We have made compromises. In the Mahabharat battle too, there were compromises," he said.

Responding to UBT Sena and MNS promising a ladki bahin type promise by offering ₹1,500 per month to women working as maids in the city and BJP in Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation promising voters not to increase property tax for the next 20 years, he said "this is the current trend, no political party can stay away from this. It may change five years later."

He spoke of how BJP-led state government had big plans to upgrade the Mumbai civic corporation. "We are executing big infra projects 'to ease living' in the city. We are adding more metro lines, upgrading rail infrastructure and have plans to put up more sewage treatment plants in Mumbai. We have plans to build a tunnel within the Bandra sea link to Bandra Kurla Complex. One of the tunnels would go to Kurla and one would go to the Mumbai international airport and from here the road would connect to the coastal road. We have planned to remove all the congestion spots in the city."