MAHARASHTRA GOVT LIES WITH CONFIDENCE, SAYS FADNAVIS

Mumbai: BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis on Thursday accused the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government of lying “with confidence”, and criticised it over a multitude of issues vis a vis Maratha, OBC reservations, handling of the Covid-19 situation, and the Sachin Waze case. Speaking at a state-level convention of his party here, the former chief minister also said the BJP will intensify its agitation until the OBC reservation in local body elections-recently quashed by the Supreme Court is restored. “It is a wrong thing, but I think we need to learn something from this government. The way the MVA government spreads lies with confidence every day, it has baffled me. We should learn to possess this confidence and not the lying trait from this government,” he said.

The previous BJP-led government had offered reservations in jobs and education to the Maratha community and political reservations to the OBCs, but the steps taken by the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress government resulted in the nullification of these decisions, Fadnavis claimed. “The state BJP will not let the MVA government breathe easy until the political reservation for OBCs is restored. We are going to intensify our agitation in coming days and will corner the government,” he said.

The government is “running away” from questions by truncating the coming monsoon session of the state legislature to only two days, the BJP leader said.

Referring to dismissed police officer Sachin Waze and alleged favours he received while handling high-profile cases, Fadnavis said, “The Waze in the police department has been nabbed. There are many such Wazes in every department under the MVA. We need to catch them as well to clean up the system.”

Waze was dismissed from service after his arrest in the case of an explosives-laden SUV found near industrialist Mukesh Ambani’s house and the murder of Thane businessman Mansukh Hiren.