CM Eknath Shinde stays away from flyover inauguration in Pune, Ajit Pawar denies overruling CM authority
Ajit Pawar's comments came in the wake of the allegation made by Wadettiwar that he (Pawar) had reviewed some projects related to basic infrastructure in the state instead of the Chief Minister.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde with Dy CMs Devendra Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar. (Image Source: PTI)
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A day after Opposition leader Vijay Wadettiwar alleged that a ‘cold war’ is brewing between Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and his deputy Ajit Pawar, the NCP leader on Saturday denied any such bitterness even as Shinde, who was supposed to attend the much-awaited inauguration of the Chandani Chowk flyover in Pune, skipped the event.
“I have not interfered in the Chief Minister’s areas of authority. As the Finance Minister, I can review various development works and projects. Do you have any problem with this?” said Pawar when asked about the reported “cold war” between him and Shinde.
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Ajit Pawar’s comments came in the wake of the allegation made by Wadettiwar that he (Pawar) had reviewed some projects related to basic infrastructure in the state instead of the Chief Minister.
“The Chief Minister heads the war room that has been set up to monitor the basic infrastructure projects in the state. While a war room exists, Pawar has decided to set up a separate monitoring section and is reviewing projects, which the Chief Minister is supposed to do. This indicates that a cold war is there between the two,” Wadettiwar said in Mumbai on Friday.
When asked as to why the Chief Minister was missing from the inauguration ceremony, Pawar said, “The Chief Minister is not attending the function as he is not well. Some people might say he is upset but he is the state’s Chief Minister and he is doing a good job.”
He added, “Earlier, Devendra Fadnavis was on one of his (Shinde) side and the other side, which was vacant, has been filled by me. Now both of us are with him.”
Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.
Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives.
Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees.
During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa.
Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died.
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