It’s Ajit and family versus the rest of the Pawar clan, as brother too chooses uncle Sharad

Others with political stakes, including the family of Pawar's eldest and younger brother, are backing Sharad Pawar's Supriya Sule in the tough battle she faces in Baramati

For Ajit, the fight is important to cement his place in the ruling NDA alliance, and to put him in contention for the CM’s post. Despite his age, Sharad Pawar remains very much in the fight. File photo

For the first time since 1968, when Sharad Pawar first contested from the seat, Baramati is set to witness a first-of-its-kind Pawar versus Pawar battle.

The latest fissure in the “first family of Baramati” came after Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar’s elder brother, Sriniwas Pawar, publicly slammed him last week for “deserting our 84-year-old uncle”. Sriniwas also declared that he, and his wife and son were with cousin Supriya Sule, the sitting Baramati MP and Pawar senior’s daughter, who could be facing Ajit Pawar’s wife Sunetra from the seat.

Sriniwas told The Indian Express: “The BJP wants to finish off Sharad Pawar politically. They are behind the split in the party and the Pawar family. Ajit must remember that he became Deputy CM of Maharashtra four times because of Sharad Pawar, who let him have the reins of the party in the state while he was in Delhi.”

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Also Read | In Supriya Sule vs Sunetra Pawar fight for Baramati, NCP camps guard against own allies

The siding of Sriniwas with the Sharad Pawar faction further cements the impression of Ajit’s “isolation” within the family — something he himself talked about recently.

While Ajit and Sriniwas’s two sisters are politically neutral, the others with Sharad Pawar include Ajit’s cousin Rajendra Pawar, his son Rohit, the sitting Karjat-Jamkhed MLA. Rajendra’s wife Sunanda and daughter Saee also back Pawar senior. Rajendra is the son of Appasaheb Pawar, Sharad Pawar’s elder brother, who is no more.

Appasaheb Pawar’s other son Ranjeet Pawar keeps away from politics.

In Ajit’s corner appear to be only his immediate family – wife Sunetra and sons Parth and Jay. Last month, he suggested he was not intimidated by this, saying: “The division in our family is clear. Apart from my immediate family, there is a possibility of everyone else being against me. But I am sure my supporters will stand by me,” he said.

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If the Sule and Sunetra face-off happens, the real fight would be between Ajit and uncle Sharad Pawar. For Ajit, the fight is important to cement his place in the ruling NDA alliance, and to put him in contention for the CM’s post. Despite his age, Sharad Pawar remains very much in the fight. “Ajun mhatara zhalo nahi (I am not yet done),” he said recently.

Manoj Dattatrye More

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades. Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died. Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More