NCP chief Sharad Pawar spoke to Foreign Minister S Jaishankar and asked him to make additional efforts to bring back the Indian students stranded along the Ukraine-Poland border as soon as possible, a party spokesman said Monday. Maharashtra NCP chief spokesman Mahesh Tapase also said Russia and Ukraine were engaged in an intense war and thousands of Indian students were stranded along the Ukraine-Poland border.
“Pawar has spoken with Foreign Minister S Jaishankar. He has asked the Center to make extra efforts to get Indian students back home as soon as possible,” said Tapase. Earlier in the day, the Center decided to send four Union ministers to Ukraine’s neighbors to facilitate a smooth and safe assessment of Indian nationals.
VK Singh will coordinate the evacuation efforts in Poland, Kiren Rijiju will be in Slovakia, Hardeep Singh Puri in Hungary and Jyotiraditya Scindia will manage the evacuation efforts from Romania and Moldova. Speaking about the controversy over Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari’s comments regarding Samarth Ramdas as Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s guru, Tapase said the NCP would have been happy if Koshyari had read the warrior king’s history before commenting .
Tapase said Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj was “not even remotely related” to Samarth Ramdas and accused Koshyari of making “a feeble attempt” to establish a relationship between the two. “He (Ramdas) was not the guru of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. Jijamata was the sole guru of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. We would have been happy if the governor had read this history earlier,” he said. During a program held in Aurangabad on Sunday, Koshyari underlined the role of the guru (teacher), citing the examples of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj and Chandragupta Maurya.
“Many chakravartis (emperors), maharajas were born on this land. But who would have asked about Chandragupta if it weren’t for Chanakya? Who would have asked about Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj if Samarth (Ramdas) had not been there,” he had said. “I do not doubt the caliber of Chandragupta and Shivaji Maharaj. Like a mother who plays a key role in shaping her child. Likewise, the role of guru (teacher) has a big place in our society,” the governor said.
Speaking about the arrest of NCP leader and minister of state Nawab Malik by the Enforcement Directorate in a money laundering case, Tapase said the former had been “frauded” in an old case. Malik is slandered for being a strong voice of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (in Maharashtra). It’s an attempt to muzzle his voice,” Tapase claimed.
BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis on Wednesday accused Malik of indulging in land deals involving the accused 1993 Mumbai series explosions and said the proceeds were used to finance terrorist financing in India. Referring to the comments of the former prime minister, Tapase said: “Fadnavis has used a new word ‘terror financing’. There is nothing like that. But this word has been used to muzzle Malik’s voice.”
When asked about the Pune Police Department registering an FIR against former City Police Chief Rashmi Shukla in connection with the alleged illegal wiretapping of selected politicians’ phones between 2015 and 2019, Tapase wondered if the former government (read BJP) had approved the IPS officer pressured to poke around politicians. Maharashtra’s Home Secretary Dilip Walse-Patil had claimed on Saturday that phones from political leaders including the head of state congress Nana Patole Bachchu Kadu, former MLA Ashish Deshmukh, former MP Sanjay Kakade and others had been tapped. “The NCP asks how come telephones were tapped when there was no permission? Were the phones tapped on someone’s behalf? Did the previous government pressure Rashmi Shukla to wiretap?” he asked.
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