Chavan hits back: They pulled down govt to help BJP

'The defeat of Congress was due to fatigue of 15 years’ rule, along with impact of corruption allegations.'

Former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan on Thursday accused the NCP of pulling down the coalition government only to help the BJP. This came at a time when NCP chief Sharad Pawar is set to share the stage with Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Baramati, “The objective of pulling down the alliance government (by NCP) was to help BJP ahead of assembly elections. The 15 days before polling are crucial and there was no urgency to pull down the government,” Chavan said.

“Senior BJP leaders had informed me about the pre-poll talks between the BJP and NCP. However, their alliance did not take place due to the opposition of a few leaders,” he said.

The former chief minister refused to comment on Modi and Pawar chief sharing the stage. “It must be to display the development work done in Baramati,” he said.

The former chief minister said he never referred to the decisions the of irrigation department (then held by NCP) as a “scam” but tried to address the shortcomings through a white paper. “I realised a few wrong decisions were taken, which were due to contractor-politician nexus,” Chavan said.

He said the defeat of Congress was due to fatigue of 15 years’ rule, along with the impact of corruption allegations. “Differences within the Congress and NCP in alliance government too had an impact,” he said.

First uploaded on: 23-01-2015 at 02:51 IST

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