Industrialist Gautam Adani met with Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Sharad Pawar in Mumbai hours before Shiv Sena (UBT) MP Sanjay Raut paid Pawar a visit at his home on Thursday night.
In south Mumbai, Raut visited Pawar at his home, “Silver Oak,” although it was unclear what exactly happened there.
The former Union minister had a visit from Adani earlier in the day, and they spoke for about two hours. The meeting had importance since Pawar supported the billionaire industrialist two weeks before. The billionaire is under fire after US-based short seller Hindenburg Research said the Adani group was engaged in “stock manipulation and accounting fraud” in a study.
The Indian conglomerate ports-to-power dismissed the study as a “malicious combination of selective misinformation and stale, baseless, and discredited allegations” and said it was in conformity with all regulatory standards.
The NCP president has adopted a different stance on the problem, claiming that the businessman was being targeted, in contrast to the Congress and other opposition parties, who are calling for a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) investigation into the Adani case.
On Sunday, Raut asserted Pawar recently assured former CM Uddhav Thackeray that his party, the NCP, would never collaborate with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), even if one member of the group decides to do so on their own.
Ajit Pawar, the leader of the opposition, criticised Raut for his remarks in his weekly column in the Marathi newspaper “Saamana” but did not name him, claiming that there was no need for him to serve as the NCP’s spokesperson.
The Rajya Sabha member Raut responded by claiming he only listens to Sharad Pawar.
The Shiv Sena (UBT) and the NCP are members of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), a coalition of opposition parties in Maharashtra that also includes the Congress.
