New Delhi: Refusing to blame the BJP for the
attack on him, Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar on Thursday sought
to downplay the incident and asked NCP workers not to take law
into their hands and maintain peace.
"I don`t think it is appropriate for me to blame any
political party for the incident. I should not go to that
level of blaming anyone," he told reporters outside his
residence, hours after a young man slapped him at a literary
function.
The NCP chief was responding to a question on Congress
blaming BJP leader Yashwant Sinha`s statement on price rise
for the attack on him.
Asserting that nobody would support such incidents, Pawar
said he intially thought the attacker was a journalist as he
suddenly emerged from a group of scribes with whom he was
interacting outside the auditorium.
"I would appeal to cadres of NCP that they should not
disturb public and should not take law into their hands. They
should maintain peace," he said in reply to a volley of
questions on the attack against him.
Asked about Anna Hazare`s comments wondering whether he
was slapped only once, Pawar sarcastically said: "It must be
some kind of Gandhiism. I too heard about this new Gandhiism."
Pawar maintained that he never had any personal enemies
in his 50 years of public life though he might have picked up
political fights during his career.
"I never had any enemies in the past and will not have in
the future too," he said.
"I cannot understand the intentions behind this incident,
but whatever it is, I should not talk much on this," he said.
Asked whether he would forgive the attacker, he shot
back: "Who am I to forgive? I am not a judge."
PTI
