Sharad Pawar: The Bheeshma Pitamaha of Indian Politics
Dressed in his trademark and iconic iron-crisp and spotless white half-shirt and white trousers, two Pilot pens his shirt pocket, white round-dial watch and usually a file in his left hand, Sharad Pawar, the founder-President of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) is ready early in the mornings. An early riser, after a light breakfast, the veteran politician moves out of his Mumbai’s Silver Oak bungalow to his office for meetings, taking umpteen numbers of calls, joins video-conference meetings and attends daily engagements – returning only in the evening after sunset or even later.
He sticks to his routine like a watch, also the party symbol of the 21-year old NCP.
Taking all due precautions in the wake of the Covid-19 viral pandemic, he also takes time out to criss-cross Maharashtra, preferably by road indulging in his favourite activity - wherever possible meeting people and gauging their pulse. Sometimes he takes out a pen and takes notes though he is blessed with elephantine memory.
This has been a sort of routine for Pawar for the last one year – since the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress government came to power in Maharashtra. Of the 12 months of the Trimurti alliance led by Chief Minister and Shiv Sena President Uddhav Thackeray, nearly nine months have gone in handling the crisis involving Covid-19 pandemic and this is going to continue.
Being Pawar saheb is not an easy task – it needs a lot of leg-work and ideation and taking calls and taking stand on crucial issues involving the state and the country.
Pawar turns 80 on 12 December – and in over five decades of his political career – he has earned sobriquet like ‘Maratha strongman’, ‘Chanakya’, 'Machiavelli' and ‘Bheeshma Pitamaha’ of Indian politics.
Pawar is one of those rare politicians in the country– who never lost a Vidhan Sabha or Lok Sabha polls. Pawar had won the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly polls from Baramati in 1967, 1972, 1978, 1980, 1985 and 1990 and Lok Sabha polls from Baramati in 1984, 1996, 1998, 1999 and 2004 and two Rajya Sabha from his home state. He had been a four-time Maharashtra Chief Minister and three-time Union Minister having handled portfolios of Defence in the PV Narasimha Rao and Agriculture in Dr Manmohan Singh governments. He had also served as Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha and Maharashtra Legislative Assembly, also a rare distinction.
Pawar has fought many battles in the past and ahead the 2019 Vidhan Sabha elections, the BJP went all out to target the veteran from Baramati but he chose to become the architect of MVA, he gave the Opposition parties that the skills of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his lieutenant Amit Shah can surely be challenged. Though in a bargaining position, NCP gallantly stepped aside install Shiv Sena, the ally of BJP of 30 years, to head the government and anointed his late personal friend Balasaheb Thackeray’s son Uddhav on the top job. He not only gave the BJP a run for their money but even proved that political skills were probably superior to BJP's trouble-shooters.
At homefront too he had repeatedly made it clear that while his daughter Supriya Sule will remain in national politics, his ambitious nephew Ajit Pawar and the latter’s team will manage Maharashtra’s affairs. Though the 80-hour government that Pawar formed with BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis, was sort of a jolt to him and the Pawar-clan – but he managed to quell the rebellion. The junior Pawar returned as Deputy Chief Minister in the new government.
Pawar’s friendship cuts across party lines – and most leaders across the length and breadth of the country consult the astute politician on important issues. However, the master-politician never forgets or forgives an insult or betrayal.
At a time when the Indian polity is on the trajectory of becoming unipolar because of BJP’s sweep and the internal contradictions within the Congress, it is Pawar who has shown a path, despite personal attacks from BJP leaders over the last couple of years.
Given the developing scenario in the country, only Pawar perhaps knows the best way to run an alliance government, even with parties of different and diametrically-opposite ideologies. And this comes from experience - in July 1978, Pawar broke away from the Congress (U) to form a coalition government with the Janata Party. He became the youngest Chief Minister of Maharashtra when he was just 38. The Progressive Democratic Front government was dismissed in February 1980, following Indira Gandhi's return to power. Similarly, in 1999, he raised the issue of foreign origin of Sonia Gandhi, after which he along with PA Sangama and Tariq Anwar were expelled from the Congress but the same year, the newly-formed NCP and Congress joined hands to form the Democratic Front government that ran for 15 years till 2014. He was also a major binding factor of the Congress-led UPA at the Centre between 2004-14. He again proved his skills when the Congress-NCP combine joined hands with Shiv Sena, that it has been fighting for decades, and stitched the MVA to keep BJP out of power.
Pawar’s mother late Shardabai was a member of District Local Board in Pune while father late Govindrao Pawar was instrumental in starting sugar cooperative mills in Baramati region. Pawar has qualities of both parents.
In a letter that he recently penned to his mother, he said: “You travelled long distances, with the little babies on your side… Knowingly or unknowingly, all these qualities were imbibed in me which enabled me to perform satisfactorily in my public life. It was on the strength of that inspiration that I decided to rise again and travelled extensively to the remotest corners of Maharashtra. I felt a surge of new youthful energy."
His grit and determination was reelected in the historic 2019 Satara rally, when he kept on addressing an election rally in the night braving heavy rains when he campaigned for his friend and former IAS officer Dr Shriniwas Patel, who was taking of Udayanraje Bhosale, the 13th descendent of legendary Maratha warrior Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj.
The photos of Pawar drenched in rain made it in every media – print, television and digital - and helped him defeat a Chhatrapati, who had switched sides from NCP to BJP.
Pawar's experience comes from the ground-level experience unlike the Twitter-Facebook-Instagram approach of modern politicians who are often cut-off from ground realities.
Pawar ‘saheb’ is unstoppable – and there are always surprises galore in store for all - his supporters, friends, media and of course the political opponents.
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