Sunetra Pawar to be Maharashtra’s first woman Deputy CM — from behind the scenes to stepping into Ajit Pawar’s legacy

Sunetra Pawar, Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament and the wife of deceased Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, is likely to be sworn in as Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister today, according to party sources quoted by news agencies.

All of the Nationalist Congress Party's (NCP) representatives in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly and Legislative Council will gather at Vidhan Bhavan in Mumbai on Saturday at 2:00 PM.

Food and Civil Supplies Minister Chhagan Bhujbal told reporters on Friday that the party decided to finalise Sunetra Pawar as the legislative party leader and the Deputy CM.

“During our meeting with the CM, we enquired about his availability (for the swearing in) and he has said that he is available on Saturday. The swearing-in after the election of the CLP could take place tomorrow itself. All of us want Sunetra vahini [sister-in-law] to lead the legislative unit,” he said.

Late Ajit Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) is a constituent of the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi alliance in the state, along with the BJP and the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena.

But to be a Deputy CM, she will have to be elected to the Legislative Assembly or nominated to the Legislative Council within six months of taking the oath. With Ajit Pawar's death, the Baramati seat he held has become vacant. Sunetra is likely to contest from there in a bypoll.

Parth lost the election. Parth's election was the beginning of a rift in the Pawar family, according to media reports.

Five years later, Sunetra contested her first Lok Sabha election from Baramati. Her husband Ajit Pawar fielded her as the NCP candidate, backed by the BJP-led NDA, from Baramati.She lost to her sister-in-law, Supriya Sule, NCP founder Sharad Pawar’s daughter, in one of the keenly watched fights after the NCP split a year ago.

In fact, her candidature against Ajit Pawar’s sister placed her at the centre of the split within the Pawar family and the NCP. Months later, she was nominated to the Rajya Sabha, a move seen as Ajit Pawar’s attempt to hand her a formal political role after the Baramati defeat.

Sunetradid her Bachelor’s in commerce from a college in Aurangabad (now Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar) in 1983. She married Ajit in 1985, after the two first met earlier that year.

Sunetra, however, was actively involved in social initiatives in Baramati. Her first major public work was in Kathewadi, the Pawar family’s ancestral village near Baramati, where she led a sanitation drive after noticing poor hygiene and open defecation.

Kathewadi later developed into a model eco-village with solar streetlights, biogas plants, waste management systems, and organic farming practices.

She was also involved in setting up the Baramati Hi Tech Textile Park in 2008, a report in the Indian Express said.

The NCP suffered a split in 2023 when Ajit Pawar, along with many senior leaders, broke away from the party led by his uncle, veteran politician Sharad Pawar, and joined the BJP-Shiv Sena coalition in Maharashtra.

Kiran Gujar, who has been associated with Ajit Pawar since before his entry into politics in the mid-1980s, told PTI that Ajit Pawar had confided in him about this only five days before Wednesday's fatal plane crash.