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Updated: Dec 29, 2018 00:34 IST

Union minister Nitin Gadkari on Tuesday dismissed media reports that he criticised the Bharatiya Janata Party leadership over the recent assembly election defeats in key heartland states, and added that he did not harbour any prime ministerial ambitions ahead of next year’s Lok Sabha elections.

Gadkari said his recent remarks were “twisted by the media”, denying that he had remarked on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s style of functioning. “I am happy with my current assignment. I have never aspired or asked for more,” Gadkari said.

At a lecture in Delhi on Monday, Gadkari was quoted as saying: “I believe that overall, majority of the IPS, IAS officers are clean and do a good job but if I am the party president, and my MPs and MLAs are not doing well, then who is responsible?” The remark came two days after the 61-year-old leader, a former BJP president, said in Pune that the “leadership should own up to defeat and failures”.

Media reports said Gadkari’s remarks alluded to the recent assembly election defeats of the BJP in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. The Congress clinched power in the three states, with analysts saying it will enter the 2019 Lok Sabha elections with renewed confidence to challenge the BJP.

Being projected by a section of the media as the ‘lone’ critic of PM Modi and BJP president Amit Shah in the party, Gadkari said his speeches had no political overtones. “My entire speech in Marathi is available. Whatever I said was in the context of banking and in no way referred it to any election nor any political leader.”

“Over the last few days, I have noticed a sinister campaign by some opposition parties and a section of the media to twist my statements and use them out of context, give inexplicable political overtones, draw politically motivated inferences to malign the party and me,” he added.

Gadkari, who is considered close to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, has repeatedly denied that he plans to be a claimant to the PM’s post. “The 2019 Lok Sabha elections will be held under the leadership of Modi and there is no dispute about it.”

A senior function of the RSS, which is considered the BJP’s ideological parent, said the outfit does not want any change in the party’s leadership. “The RSS considers that only Modi can retain the power at the Centre in 2019 elections,” the RSS leader said on condition of anonymity.