Gloves are finally off between uncle and nephew

After Ajit’s first address to his faction’s workers soon after taking oath as deputy chief minister, he had stopped personally attacking his uncle. But latest developments indicate that he is out to finish Pawar politically. His announcement of contesting four Lok Sabha seats including Pawar family pocket-borough Baramati confirms this. It remains to be seen if he fields wife Sunetra or son Parth as is being speculated.

Since June this year, when Ajit Pawar split the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and joined the Shiv Sena-BJP government in the state, there have been speculations that he had a tacit understanding with his uncle Sharad Pawar. Several ruling party leaders have been insisting that the senior Pawar would follow Ajit to the BJP camp. Last week’s developments, however, indicate otherwise.

HT Image

Ajit has alleged that Pawar himself had asked party legislator Jitendra Awhad and some others to organise protests after he resigned as NCP chief in May to force him to withdraw his resignation. He also said it was Pawar who had called him and his ministers at the latter’s office at Y B Chavan Center after Ajit took oath as deputy chief minister but the impression was created that they went on their own to meet the NCP chief. According to insiders from both the NCP factions, the way Ajit attacked his uncle during a party conclave at Karjat last week is a clear indication that the gloves are off.

After Ajit’s first address to his faction’s workers soon after taking oath as deputy chief minister, he had stopped personally attacking his uncle. But latest developments indicate that he is out to finish Pawar politically. His announcement of contesting four Lok Sabha seats including Pawar family pocket-borough Baramati confirms this. It remains to be seen if he fields wife Sunetra or son Parth as is being speculated.

The mood seems to be the same in the Pawar camp as two leaders close to the NCP chief have started attacking Ajit. First is his grand-nephew Rohit, who had been careful not to train guns on Ajit so far. Another is Jitendra Awhad who knows his boss too well. Ajit’s aides are also suspecting that Maratha activist Manoj Jarange Patil’s barbs aimed at him and his colleagues could be inspired by people in the Pawar camp.

In a nutshell, a straight battle between the uncle and nephew seems to have begun four months before the Lok Sabha elections.

In the line of fire

The protests by Maratha villagers against NCP (Ajit faction) minister and prominent OBC leader Chhagan Bhujbal last week have led to speculations whether Bhujbal would be able to get re-elected from Yeola constituency in Nashik that has elected him four times in a row. Yeola has an almost equal number of Mali (gardener) community that Bhujbal belongs to and Marathas. So far, Bhujbal was in a position of advantage as Malis voted for him as “aapla manus” (one of them) and a significant number of Marathas voted because of the NCP banner. Following the split in the party, Pawar held one of his first rallies in Yeola, apologised to the people there for choosing a wrong candidate all these years and promised to correct the mistake.

Bhujbal now hopes that the Maratha votes gets divided between his opponents and he gets all the OBC votes. According to NCP insiders, there are three leaders of Ajit faction who are on the hit list of Pawar for helping Ajit split the party—Bhujbal, Sunil Tatkare and Dhananjay Munde. Tatkare, the most trusted aide of Ajit, is Lok Sabha MP from Raigad. To defeat him, Pawar got the Peasants and Workers Party into the MVA coalition. PWP has support base in four out of six assembly segments in Raigad constituency. Further, he has supported the candidature of Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Anant Geete who comes from Kunbi community which has a sizeable presence in the Konkan belt. There are also speculations that a bitter tussle between Marathas and Wanjari caste which comes under larger OBC umbrella could make Dhananjay Munde’s task to win election from his Parli constituency difficult.

Arrogance of the minister?

School education minister Deepak Kesarkar is generally known as someone who rarely loses his temper. However, he is drawing flak after a video of him threatening a young woman complaining about technical glitches in teachers’ recruitment examination went viral last week. In the video, the woman is seen complaining how the candidates are finding it difficult to file applications for the recruitment. Kesarkar who was apparently irked because she interrupted his interaction with mediapersons, is seen telling the girl that the system is alright and she should have patience. Not satisfied, the woman kept pointing out the glitches which angered Kesarkar further. He then threatened her that he would disqualify her from the recruitment drive. This has evoked strong reactions with the opposition accusing the minister of being arrogant.

Food for thought

A circular issued by the state home department recently became a talking point among Mantralaya staffers. It advised the home department staff attending the winter session of legislature in Nagpur to take precautions in terms of clothes and food. It is much colder in Nagpur compared to Mumbai. The staffers should carry suitable clothes and should also not forget their medicines, it said. They were also advised to avoid food and drinks that could affect their health. Most staffers are scratching their heads why such a circular was issued.