NCP leader Ajit Pawar quits as MLA ahead of Assembly elections

Mumbai: Senior NCP leader Ajit Pawar has resigned from the post of legislator and the same has been accepted, Maharashtra Assembly Speaker Haribhau Bagade said on Friday.

Bagade said he received the resignation of Pawar, former deputy CM and nephew of NCP chief Sharad Pawar, in the evening.

The Speaker said Ajit Pawar did not disclose the reason while tendering the resignation.


"He gave his hand written resignation letter to my PS. He called me up from there. I was surprised. I asked Dada (Ajit Pawar) why he was doing so. Dada told me he would tell me later. He insisted me to accept the resignation letter," Bagade told a news channel.

Ajit Pawar, who represented the Baramati segment, remained incommunicado.

Other NCP leaders too said they were clueless about their leader's move.

"He is unreachable. We are clueless on this (resignation) and the reasons," a senior leader said.

Earlier in the day, key NCP leaders and scores of party workers thronged the city in support of party chief Sharad Pawar, who had planned to visit the Enforcement Directorate office here after the agency registered a money- laundering case against him.

Ajit Pawar, however, could not be seen. NCP leaders who were alongside Sharad Pawar, however, maintained Ajit Pawar was in his rain-battered Pune district.