Selfie row: BJP defends 'hardworking' Pankaja Munde

Voicing its support for Maharashtra's Rural Development Minister Pankaja Munde, who stirred a controversy after posting selfies during her visit to drought-hit Latur, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday said she is a hard working leader and is being misinterpreted.

Minister of State for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Rajiv Pratap told ANI that Munde has been making relentless endeavours to pull Maharashtra out of the water crisis and is being misinterpreted.

"Pankaja is a very good politician, very hard working politician and she is a minister of a department which is reeling under water crisis. She in scorching heat is visiting the effected places and making sure that the work is done. She is being misinterpreted," said Rudy.

"The selfie, which is doing rounds against her, was taken at a trench. From past many days Pankaja was monitoring many such trenches but no water was found. The place where she took a photo was a trench where water was cited. The photo she took was out of happiness. I think a hard working Minister like Pankaja takes a photo after finding water at a time when major efforts were made to locate water is nothing bad. All of the case is being misconstrued. We should get over all these things and work collectively to help Maharashtra combat such situation," he added.

Earlier in the day Munde clarified that she clicked those pictures to appreciate the work done by the local administration in this hour of crisis.

Munde took to micro blogging site Twitter to put forth her stand for clicking photographs on the drought-hit land.

"This pics are work done by govt n ppl participation it's my dept n I was working from day 1sence of satisfaction if it rains we are ready," she tweeted.

Munde had yesterday posted a series of selfies on Twitter while reviewing the efforts on water conservation in drought-hit Latur.

The BJP leader's selfies with the hapless farmers have gone viral on the social media for which she is also trolled by the users.