Elected govts are toppled if they do not accept BJP's ideology: Sharad Pawar

Nagpur: NCP chief Sharad Pawar on Friday alleged that democratically elected governments in the states are brought down if they do not adhere to the BJP's ideology.

Speaking before a gathering of NCP workers here, he accused the BJP's central leadership of imposing their ideology on state governments run by non-BJP parties.

If these governments do not toe the line, they are toppled, said Pawar.

Last month, the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress coalition government in Maharashtra collapsed after the Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde rebelled along with a majority of his party's MLAs.

Pawar said earlier in Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka, non-BJP governments were brought down by engineering defections, and the BJP came to power in both the states.

In the same way, "those in power in Delhi decided to take away power from a government that was running well in Maharashtra," the NCP supremo said.

The message was "do as we tell you and accept our ideology or we would not let a democratic government function," he said.

"But such things do not last....wherever autocracy took over in the world, it did not last long," the senior politician added.

In neighbouring Sri Lanka, we just saw how power was misused by one family (the Rajapaksas) and how its rule was overthrown by people, Pawar added.

Party workers should remain united and adhere to the Constitution framed by Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, he said.