Buzz over Ajit Pawar not attending NCP meet today in Mumbai

MUMBAI: Ajit Pawar's name is missing from the list of invitees for NCP's one-day convention in the city on Friday, triggering fresh speculation in party circles that he was being sidelined for political reasons.
NCP president Sharad Pawar will address the convention on the subject of NCP's aim "to develop Mumbai as a world-class city". State NCP president Jayant Patil will preside over the inaugural session. Besides Patil, Praful Patel, Supriya Sule, Sunil Tatkare, and former ministers Chhagan Bhujbal, Jitendra Awhad and Anil Deshmukh will interact with party workers.
According to an NCP leader, the party's convention in Mumbai was originally supposed to be held on Thursday and Ajit Pawar had given his consent for it. However, it was later rescheduled for Friday, following which Ajit Pawar expressed his inability to attend as he had already accepted invitations for more than half-a-dozen events in the Pune region for that day. Since Ajit said he could not attend, he did not feature on the list of invitees.
Meanwhile, Ajit Pawar on Thursday wrote two separate letters to governor Ramesh Bais and chief minister Eknath Shinde demanding a judicial probe into the Kharghar tragedy. Two days ago, Ajit Pawar had dismissed as baseless the speculation that he was going to quit the NCP and join the BJP. He also said then that he would not leave the NCP till his last breath and alleged that rumours were being spread to defame him and cause a rift in the NCP.