Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Sharad Pawar would have known for a while that his nephew Ajit Pawar was ready to bolt. What has perhaps taken the old warhorse by surprise is that a large number of party legislators have followed him to join the ruling coalition of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Shiv Sena (Eknath Shinde). This includes Beedi-king Praful Patel, Pawar’s one-time political points-person, who had ironically been appointed as one of the Working Presidents of the NCP to marginalise Ajit Pawar.
Ajit Pawar was at one time being groomed as Sharad Pawar’s political successor and conducted himself as the designated crown prince. However, once Sharad Pawar’s daughter Supriya Sule came into politics, the family dynamics seems to have changed. After her Rajya Sabha stint, she was handed Sharad Pawar’s own Lok Sabha constituency Baramati, signalling that she would inherit his political legacy. When she was appointed Working President of the NCP, not only in charge of Maharashtra but also of co-ordination with other Opposition parties in Delhi, Ajit Pawar knew that he was out of the succession race. Finally, it led to his rebellion against his uncle’s political plans.
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There is a parallel between the succession saga of the NCP and of the Shiv Sena, its partner in the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA). Bal Thackeray initially promoted his nephew Raj Thackeray as his successor as his own son, Uddhav Thackeray, showed little or no interest in politics. However, when Uddhav Thackeray developed political ambitions, the Shiv Sena chief weighed in favour of his son. Bal Thackeray ensured that his son took over the reins of the party from him in his lifetime — as working president in 2003 and then in 2006 as Editor-in-Chief of the party mouthpiece ‘Saamna’. Once he realised he was not going to lead the Shiv Sena, Raj Thackeray broke off and formed the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) in 2006.
The inheritance of the Shiv Sena was, however, finally decided by the electorate. The rank and file of Shiv Sena went decisively with the Uddhav Thackeray-led party in the 2009 Maharashtra assembly elections where the Shiv Sena got three times as many seats (44) than the MNS (13). There is lingering belief even after the second split in the Shiv Sena, that the cadre of the party may be with Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) and not with the faction led by Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde. This is the reason for Shinde’s apparent reluctance to hold the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation elections which were due in March 2022. So also in the case of the NCP, the voters will decide who leads the party eventually — Ajit Pawar or Supriya Sule.
There is a difference between the recent Uddhav-Shinde split in the Shiv Sena and the break-up of the NCP. In the case of the Shiv Sena, the pressure on the MLAs to defect to the Shinde camp came from the alleged involvement of a large number in cases of corruption. It would be a mistake, however, to see Ajit Pawar split in the same way. Although some of the NCP defectors have cases of economic offences registered against them, they also probably prefer Ajit Pawar’s leadership. They probably think that Supriya Sule is effective only in her father’s shadow and are possibly thinking of life after senior Pawar.
Despite being 82 years old and a cancer survivor, Sharad Pawar is still raring to go. His behaviour has been exemplary, and his political statements balanced in the wake of the split. He has said that he has great faith in the people of Maharashtra, especially the youth, and that the people will decide who the NCP belongs to.
However, given his age, it is difficult to believe in his rallying cry that questions about the future of the party are not new to him and that he has risen from the ashes earlier. “After the election in 1980, of the 58 MLAs of the party I was leading, all MLAs left except six. I formed the party again by taking five MLAs with me. In the next election, except for two or three people who left us, all of them lost,” he told reporters. But then he was barely 39 years old. If he is right in claiming that only the people will decide the fate of his party, this will be evident in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The assembly elections in Maharashtra are due only later, in October 2024.
The jolt to Sharad Pawar will certainly be felt in the Opposition that is trying to close ranks against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for 2024. Sharad Pawar’s role in bringing the Opposition parties together could now receive a set-back. There may be scepticism of his leading role in building unity between the Opposition parties because he has been unable to keep his own party together.
Moreover, as even the united NCP had only five seats in the Lok Sabha, his weight in the Opposition will go down — with people wondering if he might bring even less than that number to the table in 2024. Also, if Pawar must double-down to save his home turf in Maharashtra, he may not have much time to deal with mercurial Opposition leaders like Mamata Banerjee and Arvind Kejriwal.
The Opposition’s focus on consolidation could also be diverted now by anxiety for the integrity of their own parties. Who is to say that the BJP will not facilitate splits in other opposition parties, especially the Janata Dal (United) in Bihar or even the Congress in that state? The Congress would be most worried in Rajasthan where the bargaining power of rebel leader Sachin Pilot has received an unexpected boost from the developments in Maharashtra.
Most importantly, the perception gaining ground that the BJP was on the backfoot after its defeat in Karnataka, will now be dispelled, and there will be no room left for complacency as the political scene hots up.
(Bharat Bhushan is a Delhi-based journalist.)
Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.