Over the past three decades, countless challengers have attempted to violate Pawar Bastion of dynasty, yet election victory has always been in favor of the patriarch and the NCP founder Sharad PawarOr his chosen heir. However, this time, the 83-year-old warrior is not facing an outside rival but an astute insider, his nephew. Ajit Pawar Who wants to test the limits of his dominance. Ajit, once a disciple of senior Pawar, has parted ways with the party, taking its name and its election symbol – a clock.
Ruling from a ruined fortress – now called the NCP (SCP) – Sharad Pawar has crowned his three-time MP daughter, Supriya Suleto lead the charge from baramati, which is the stronghold of the family. Ajit Pawar, who is currently one of the two deputy CMs of Maharashtra, has fielded his wife. Sunetra Pawar,
On the surface, it is a battle of Supriya versus Sunetra, but it symbolizes a desperate struggle for legitimacy and dominance within Baramati’s most powerful family. Supriya has inherited fragmented support and unfamiliarity among voters with a new symbol – ‘a man playing the tutari’ – and faces the formidable NCPBJP-Shiv Sena alliance. grand alliance, Whereas Sunetra neither has the connect with voters nor the charisma of a politician. Political analyst Abhay Deshpande says Supriya can take advantage of the victim card, while Sunetra, being a newbie, can only rely on her husband’s track record.
Additionally, Supriya faces anti-establishment sentiments, he says. Meanwhile, the ground situation looks favorable for Sunetra. Of the six assembly constituencies under Baramati Lok Sabha seat, four are with the ruling Mahayuti – two with the NCP and two with the BJP; and two with the Congress, which, along with the NCP (SCP), is part of the opposition alliance Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA). So, on the Baramati Lok Sabha seat, Sharad Pawar’s faction has no MLA, while his nephew’s group has two – Baramati Assembly seat (represented by Ajit Pawar himself) and Indapur (filled by NCP’s Dattatreya Bharne).
Former state ministers Harshvardhan Patil (BJP) and Vijay Shivtare (Shiv Sena), who hold influence in Indapur and Purandar and were earlier at odds with Ajit Pawar, announced their support for the deputy CM, now supporting him in Khadakwasla. It is expected to meet and Daund, two assembly constituencies are under the control of BJP. Supriya, on the other hand, is hoping for support from loyalists and sympathy for her father, apart from votes from Bhor and Purandar, two assembly constituencies led by the Congress.
The rise of Pawar, and other Pawars
A look at the career graphs of Sharad and Ajit Pawar shows that both of them had humble beginnings and made great progress. In the early 1960s, the then Chief Minister Yashwantrao Chavan saw potential in Sharad Pawar during his college days in Pune. Sharad Pawar became influential in the Youth Congress and at the age of 27 he won his first assembly election from Baramati, after which he became the youngest Chief Minister of Maharashtra and attained the rank of Union Minister.
Under the guidance of his uncle, Ajit started as a director in a sugar co-operative society. In 1991, he made his political debut and won the Baramati Lok Sabha seat. However, he later had to resign to take over the post of Union Minister from his uncle. Moving forward rapidly, Ajit secured the Baramati assembly seat and became a minister in the Sudhakarrao Naik-led Congress government in Maharashtra. Sharad Pawar’s separation from Congress in 1999 and formation of NCP helped Ajit to move forward.
Becoming a prominent figure, Ajit extended his influence across the state while his uncle focused on national affairs. Political analysts say that amidst all this, uncle-nephew rivalry existed, albeit to a lesser extent. It reached its peak in 2019 when a rebel Ajit Pawar marched to Raj Bhavan and took oath as deputy CM, forming an alliance with BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis as CM. This honeymoon proved to be short-lived and Ajit returned. However, cracks remained.
“Within the NCP, there were always two factions. Due to this, there was often a power struggle between the two. The fact that Ajit is hardly mentioned in his uncle’s autobiography, ‘Lok Mej Sangati’, points to long-standing differences between them,” Professor of Political Science at Shivaji University, Kolhapur Prakash Pawar says.
In 2023, after Sharad Pawar announced that he would step down from the post of National President of NCP, Ajit was a contender for the post. Later, after huge demand from his followers, he reversed this decision. Eventually, in July that year, Ajit decided it was time to fulfill his ambitions and joined the Eknath Shinde-led government with a group of MLAs and MLCs. The Baramati seat, held by Sharad Pawar since 1996 (Sharad Pawar from 1996 to 2009 and Supriya Sule from 2009 to 2019), is the only seat in Maharashtra where there will be a woman versus woman fight.
