Kamat wants Rao’s neck

The NCP-Congress alliance hit a new low on Saturday evening, when in a late evening development, city Congress chief Gurudas Kamat demanded the ouster of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Sharad Rao and Republican Party’s minister of state for housing Pritamkumar Shegaonkar.

Early on Saturday morning, Rao had dubbed the policies of the Centre and state government as ‘anti-worker’ and ‘anti-slum’. Contending that Rao should have known that his own party NCP was a part of the government, Kamat demanded an apology out of Rao. “The NCP must oust him otherwise,” he said.

Kamat also maintained that the Congress could only give NCP a share of 60 of the 227 seats. NCP leaders have been demanding 75 seats. Kamat contended that Shegaonkar’s party RPI, an alliance partner in the DF government, had now formed a third front that plans to fight against Congress-NCP in all BMC seats.

Reacting to Kamat’s demand, NCP leader Sachin Ahir said, “Removing Rao from the party is out of question. He had only aired his viewpoint as a union leader. In a democratic environment, every person is allowed to air his opinion.”