Baramati battle goes full throttle

Mumbai: As the campaigning for Lok Sabha in Baramati goes full throttle, the two warring factions of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) have launched massive outreach in all the six Vidhan Sabha segments.

Whether it is NCP (SCP) leader Sharad Pawar’s daughter and three-time sitting MP Baramati Supriya Sule or Deputy Chief Minister and NCP President Ajit Pawar’s wife Sunetra Pawar, they are leaving no stones unturned.

The six Assembly segments are— Daund, Indapur, Baramati, Purandar, Thor and Khadakwasla, and two each are held by NCP, Congress and BJP, post the 2019 Vidhan Sabha polls.

There are several Pawar-family detractors and opponents in the Lok Sabha seat.

While Daund and Khadakwasla are with BJP, Indapur and Baramati are with NCP, Purandar and Bhor are with the Congress.

As far as Baramati is concerned, Ajit Pawar is the seven-time sitting MLA from this seat and wins with record margin. In the last two elections, 2014 and 2019, the Indapur seat was won by Dattatreya Bharne, a close associate of Ajit Pawar. Before this, the seat was represented by Harshawardhan Patil five times, of which four times as an Independent and once with the Congress. Now with BJP, Patil was elected as President of the National Federation of Cooperative Sugar Factories (NFCSF).

For the last two elections, Daund is represented by Rahul Kul, once for Rashtriya Samaj Paksha and once with BJP. Kul is a close aide of BJP’s Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. It may be recalled, in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, Kul’s wife Kanchan Kul was fielded against Supriya Sule, but the BJP candidate lost the polls. However, Kanchan managed to get 5,30,940 votes as against 6,86,714 of the winning candidate.

Khadakwasla is represented by BJP’s Bhimrao Tapkir, who is a veteran of Pune politics.

Purandar is represented by Sanjay Jagtap of the Congress, who had defeated Vijay Shivtare of Shiv Sena, and had represented the seat twice earlier. Shivtare, is now part of Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena and he had threatened to contest as an Independent or as a member of Narendra Modi Vichar Manch. Shivtare is a detractor of the Pawar-clan.

Bhor is being represented for the last three terms by Sangram Thopte. His father, Anantrao Thopte, is a five-time former MLA. The senior Thopte was once arch-rival of senior Pawar. In fact, both sides have reached out to senior Thopte— first as Sunetra Pawar and then the senior Pawar.