New Delhi: The Ajit Pawar faction is the real Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), the Election Commission announced on Tuesday, ending months of speculation over the factional fight with his party founder and uncle Sharad Pawar. In an order, the Election Commission (EC) also allotted the NCP symbol 'Wall Clock' to the group led by Ajit Pawar.
Ajit Pawar's supporters celebrated as ECI ruled the NCP name and symbol matter in favour of their faction.
The EC's ruling was based on rigorous assessments, including scrutiny of the party constitution's objectives and structure, as well as evaluations of both organizational and legislative support, PTI quoted the commission as saying.
As per PTI, the poll authority observed, the test of majority in the legislative wing found favour in this circumstance of the case, where both groups have found to be working outside the party constitution and the organisational elections.
The EC made a concession to the group led by Sharad Pawar by allowing it a one-time option to claim a name for its political outfit and provide three preferences by Wednesday afternoon in view of the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections, reported PTI.
In the order, the poll body stated, "When democratic elections get replaced by appointments or when the elections are held contrary to the provisions of the Party Constitution or when the elections are held in an opaque or obscure manner without disclosing the notifications, the electoral college, the place of election, etc, the result is that the Party becomes a private fiefdom of a single person or group of select individuals and the Party is run like a private enterprise. Such situations also lead to the party workers, who are at the bottom of the pyramidal hierarchy, to lose touch with the apex-level representatives."
"The political parties form an important pillar on which our democratic governance stands and when this pillar is afflicted by an undemocratic way of functioning, there will be reverberations in the national polity," it added.
Earlier, Ajit Pawar walked away with a majority of NCP MLAs in July last year and supported the BJP-Shiv Sena government led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde in Maharashtra.