Mumbai: Speaking to the media last week, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar said development of the proposed Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) industrial zone in Karjat Jamkhed will be “undertaken” at the instance of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLC Ram Shinde, who represented the assembly constituency from 2009 till 2014.
“Look, that issue (project) will be undertaken based on Ram Shinde saheb,” Ajit Pawar told the media, meaningfully raising his eyebrows amid laughter from supporters.
The statement assumes significance given that voters in Karjat Jamkhed in Ahmednagar district elected Ajit’s nephew Rohit as their MLA in 2019.
Reacting to his uncle’s remarks, Rohit challenged Ajit to prove that he won’t resort to politics when it comes to “such things”. Rohit had staged a sit-in protest in the Maharashtra assembly in July this year to demand timely implementation of the project.
“Let dada (as Ajit Pawar is called) listen to him (Ram Shinde) but we have studied the project and insist that it shouldn’t be less than 1,000 hectares. We have to bring in big factories and give employment to youth. So, if anything goes wrong in the project because of the government, we won’t sit quietly,” Rohit, the grandson of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) founder and chief Sharad Pawar’s older brother, told reporters.
The 38-year-old grandson of noted agriculturist Dinkarrao ‘Appasaheb’ Pawar added: “We used to earlier say ‘dada, you don’t do politics’. Today is the time to prove it. You are the deputy CM and today you have the chance to prove that you are not partisan.”
This frosty exchange — one of many — sheds light on ties between members of the powerful Pawar clan. Fissures in the relationship surfaced after Ajit rebelled against his uncle, NCP’s 83-year-old founder and chief Sharad Pawar, in July this year and with the support of a significant chunk of the party’s legislators and office bearers allied with the ruling Maha Yuti Alliance led by CM Eknath Shinde and Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis.
Despite this, the two factions have been mindful of their political rhetoric against each other. While Sharad Pawar and his daughter and Baramati MP Supriya Sule have steered clear of any direct verbal attacks on Ajit, Rohit appears to have no such qualms.
From reportedly staying away from the annual Pawar family Diwali gathering this year to openly criticising Ajit on social media as well as on the floor of the House, he wasted no opportunity to express his displeasure with his uncle’s political manoeuvring.
On his part, while Ajit has held back from making direct attacks on uncle Sharad Pawar and cousin Supriya Sule, he too hasn’t shied away from taking the occasional jibe at Rohit.
In December, Ajit mocked the Yuva Sangharsh Yatra that his nephew was spearheading. Speaking at a workshop at Raigad’s Karjat, he said: “What sangharsh (struggle) is he talking about? Have you (Rohit) ever done sangharsh in your life?”
According to political observers, the ongoing feud between uncle and nephew is meant to drive home the message of a split within the party, especially with both parliamentary and state assembly elections looming.
“There was some doubt in the minds of the cadres whether NCP had actually split. That’s why an assurance had to be given to the cadres,” political analyst Abhay Deshpande told ThePrint. “It needed to be told that there’s been a split, and with elections looming, a straight message had to be given. That’s why this aggressive stand.”
ThePrint reached both Ajit and Rohit Pawar via calls for comment but had not received a response by the time of publication. This report will be updated if and when a response is received.
However, Sanjay Tatkare, spokesperson of the Ajit Pawar-led faction, believes Rohit wants to take the place that Ajit once held in the party. “Rohit wants to keep himself centre stage and take the position of Ajit dada. That’s why these statements,” he said.
Also Read: Loyalty, boundaries, revolt — what shapes the ‘Pawar brand of politics’ and where it’s headed
Pawar versus Pawar
Rohit Pawar is the younger son of Appasaheb’s son Rajendra Pawar and his wife Sunanda.
While other branches of the Pawar family have been in active politics for decades now, Rohit’s side of the family has maintained a relatively low-profile, while running the family business, Baramati Agro.
Rohit began his political career in 2017 as a member of Pune zilla parishad. He was elected with a record number of votes. He is now the MLA from Karjat Jamkhed and president of the Maharashtra Cricket Association (MCA) — following in the footsteps of Sharad Pawar, who was president of the Mumbai Cricket Association and that of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).
Ajit, meanwhile, is the son of Sharad Pawar’s other brother, the late Anantrao Pawar. He was once seen as one of the tallest leaders in the NCP, second only to Sharad Pawar, and was even considered his heir apparent, even though the NCP patriarch never explicitly anointed him his political successor. However, all this changed in 2009, when Sule entered public life by getting elected as the MP from Baramati — the Pawars’ bastion.
While tensions simmered within the family between the cousins since, they did not spill out into the open until 2019, and more recently last year. In 2019, just as the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) alliance of the undivided Shiv Sena, the Congress, and the NCP were in talks to form the government following the results of the assembly polls, Ajit attempted to stage a coup by taking oath as deputy chief minister to BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis.
That government did not last and was replaced by one led by Uddhav Thackeray but Ajit was again appointed deputy chief minister after his return to the fold.
But tensions in the Pawar family now appear to have permeated the third generation. The contest between Rohit and Ajit’s older son Parth to claim Sharad Pawar’s legacy is playing out almost like a proxy for the tussle between the NCP patriarch and nephew Ajit Pawar.
While Parth lost the parliamentary election from Maval in 2019 — the first Pawar to lose an election — Rohit, who had had his grandnephew’s stamp of approval, won the assembly polls only five months later, beating two-time BJP MLA Ram Shinde. “Senior Pawar always took Rohit along with him for press conferences or rallies. No doubt he has his blessings. It’s not easy to impress him,” a source close to Rohit told ThePrint.
Battle for legacy
As for the proposal for an MIDC industrial zone in Karjat Jamkhed, differences between Ajit and Rohit on the issue first came to light during the monsoon session of the state legislature this year when Rohit staged a protest outside the assembly.
“The government responded to the letter on 1 July stating that a meeting of all stakeholders will be organised and the appropriate decision will be taken. Rohit should withdraw the protest,” Ajit had reportedly said then.
But this was not the only issue over which Rohit locked horns with his uncle.
In October, while questioning the state of under-construction hospital projects in Maharashtra, the Karjat Jamkhed MLA alleged that Ajit, who handles the finance portfolio in the Shinde government, had stopped funds to them at the instance of Fadnavis.
“The construction work at government-run hospitals in Karjat and Jamkhed tehsils is partially completed. The work is now stuck because of a lack of funds. Ajit Pawar is finance minister, but BJP leader and Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has instructed that funds cannot be released without his permission,” Rohit claimed in a post on X.
He added: “I find this is an attempt to control Ajit Pawar, equivalent to Mr Fadnavis by designation. Who will take the responsibility if a person loses his life because of lack of treatment?”
Although Ajit did not react to the statement at the time, Suraj Chavan, a leader of the NCP faction led by him said the deputy CM allocated Rs 1,827.65 crore to the constituency, of which Rs 106 crore was allocated through the public health department, while Rs 25 crore was allocated for improvement of healthcare services in the two tehsils.
“Ajit dada never does politics over such work,” Chavan had remarked.
Against this backdrop, Rohit’s absence from the annual Pawar family Diwali celebration in Baramati also raised eyebrows. Though he cited “prior commitments”, his absence was seen in light of Supriya Sule’s statement that family and politics “are different things”.
दरवर्षीप्रमाणे यंदाही दिवाळी पाडव्यानिमित्त आदरणीय पवार साहेब हे बारामतीत कार्यकर्ते, पदाधिकारी, नागरिक यांना उद्या (मंगळवार) भेटून शुभेच्छा स्वीकारणार आहेत. यावेळी मलाही उपस्थित राहण्याची इच्छा होती, मात्र मध्यंतरी जाळपोळ झालेल्या बीड येथील राष्ट्रवादी काँग्रेस पक्षाच्या…
— Rohit Pawar (@RRPSpeaks) November 13, 2023
भाऊ-बहिणीच्या पवित्र नात्याची वीण अधिक घट्ट करणारा सण म्हणजे भाऊबीज…या सणाच्या निमित्ताने सर्वांना हार्दिक शुभेच्छा.🙏🏼 pic.twitter.com/4yJkbLf1Dv
— Supriya Sule (@supriya_sule) November 15, 2023
According to political analyst Hemant Desai, Rohit’s growing prominence in the NCP led to some rancour in the Ajit camp. “Even when NCP was united, it looked like Rohit was the future of NCP and he started getting prominence within the party. This, along with the feeling that Parth was ignored, started brewing within Ajit,” Desai said.
But the Ajit Pawar-led faction believes Rohit is trying to cement his position. “This is a very calculated move from his (Rohit’s) side to replace what Ajit dada was to united NCP. So why should dada react? Rohit is not his competition. If at all, when the time comes, Parth might react,” said a leader in the Ajit Pawar camp who did not wish to be named.
Meanwhile, leaders close to Rohit say they believe there’s an attempt to “pollute” Ajit Pawar’s mind against him. “But the reality is there are certain limitations to senior (Sharad) Pawar — youth appeal and going out on the field regularly. This is where Rohit comes in, to give support to his granduncle and what he has built over the years,” said one such leader.
Despite these claims, political analysts believe there’s no denying that dynamics within the family have changed since the split. “Even in the past, it did not seem like Rohit and Ajit had great relations amongst themselves because we haven’t seen or heard Ajit make any statement favouring Rohit or appreciating him,” said Desai.
Deshpande added, “What Sharad Pawar probably feels is that instead of him taking on Ajit, it’s better if someone like Rohit does it so that the young crowd should get drawn to the Sharad Pawar faction. For that, an open stand needs to be taken. So in coming days, this (rivalry between Ajit and Rohit) will grow.”
(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)
Also Read: How NCP’s Pawar vs Pawar feud is in keeping with Maharashtra’s tradition of uncle-nephew conflicts