After winning 31 out of 48 seats in Maharashtra in the recent Lok Sabha elections, the opposition alliance, the Congress-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), grew overconfident that the Maharashtra electorate would support them in the state assembly polls as well. This led them to take voters for granted, spending more time in seat-sharing discussions, hopping from one luxury hotel to another in Mumbai over the last two months.Instead, they should have focused on fielding strong candidates. The MVA parties initially fought among themselves to secure the most seats in the 288-member state assembly.As a result, Sharad Pawar, who has the base and capacity to contest 60 to 65 seats with strong footing—as he did in the Lok Sabha elections—only contested ten seats. Nevertheless, he won eight of those, focusing his energy and efforts, even at the last minute.Uddhav Thackeray, following a poor performance in the Lok Sabha elections (where he secured only nine seats with the lowest strike rate in the MVA), insisted on securing more seats, even though he didn’t have strong candidates or a solid base in several constituencies.Shiv Sena (Uddhav Thackeray faction) leader Sanjay Raut publicly clashed with Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole, insulting him, and secured 98 seats, even though he had the capacity to contest only 70 to 75 seats. Uddhav Thackeray’s main goal was to capture at least 50 percent of the seats within the alliance to secure his claim for the Chief Minister’s post.Meanwhile, Sharad Pawar, who intervened in the dispute between Congress and Shiv Sena (UBT) to broker a resolution, ultimately managed to grab additional seats, increasing his party’s tally from 65 to 87 seats and raising claims for the Chief Minister’s position for his party.Sharad Pawar, however, refused to declare Uddhav Thackeray as the MVA’s Chief Ministerial candidate, hoping that if his party performed well—similar to their success in the Lok Sabha elections—his daughter, Supriya Sule, could be projected as the CM candidate.But fate had a different plan for Pawar.The Congress party, which had surged to 13 seats in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections (up from just one in 2019), sparked hopes among leaders like Balasaheb Thorat and Nana Patole, who began to fantasize about becoming the Chief Minister of Maharashtra, assuming Congress would emerge as the largest party, as it had in the Lok Sabha elections. However, they lost touch with the ground realities, assuming the rest would be a mere formality.Balasaheb Thorat, an eight-time MLA and 71 years old, was defeated by 10,560 votes by Shiv Sena candidate Amol Katal in the Sangamner constituency. Thorat had assumed that the people would automatically vote for him, even though he had not campaigned extensively. He relied too heavily on unrealistic expectations and used force where it was unnecessary.Similarly, Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole, who had claimed that Congress would win 70 seats and acted as though he were the next Chief Minister, also lost—by a narrow margin of 658 votes to BJP candidate Avinash Brahamankar in the Sakoli constituency.The MVA, as a whole, also failed to create a concrete narrative, unlike in the Lok Sabha elections when they successfully highlighted issues like “Samvidhan Bachao” and farmer distress. In the state elections, however, the MVA struggled to find direction and mostly reacted to the incumbent government’s schemes, like Ladli Bahna, instead of offering a proactive vision. They failed to establish a credible narrative and were unable to tap into the anger among soybean and cotton farmers towards the Mahayuti government.Are the political images of Sharad Pawar and Uddhav Thackeray fading?After the massive victory in the recent Lok Sabha elections, Sharad Pawar, Maharashtra’s veteran politician who was chief minister as well as Union Minister several times, who had promised to “replace the Bhakri-roti” by offering opportunities to new leadership in Maharashtra, appeared to be grooming the next generation. He often compared himself to Yashwantrao Chavan, the first Chief Minister of Maharashtra, who mentored him. However, when it came to fielding candidates for the state assembly elections, Pawar could not look beyond his own family, particularly in his home turf of Baramati, which had been represented by him and later by his nephew Ajit Pawar since the 1960s.At the age of 84, Sharad Pawar chose to field his 32-year-old grand-nephew, Yogendra Pawar, in the Baramati state assembly election against his own nephew, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar. Despite being part of the Pawar family, voters in Baramati preferred the experienced second-generation leader, Ajit Pawar, over the third-generation scion.In the Lok Sabha elections, Ajit Pawar’s spouse, Sunetra Pawar, lost to Sharad Pawar’s daughter, Supriya Sule, by 1.5 lakh votes. In the Baramati state assembly segment, Sunetra trailed by over 48,000 votes. Meanwhile, in the state assembly polls, Ajit Pawar won by a significant 100,899 votes against his own grand-nephew Yogendra Pawar, further solidifying his position within the party.This wasn’t an isolated case. In the neighboring constituency of Indapur, Sharad Pawar fielded the veteran Harshvardhan Patil, who had lost in the previous state elections. Once again, history repeated itself as NCP MLA Datta Mama Bharne defeated Patil by 19,075 votes. Similar outcomes were seen in other constituencies like Kagal and Ambegaon, where candidates backed by Ajit Pawar triumphed over those aligned with Sharad Pawar.The NCP led by Ajit Pawar contested 59 seats and won 41, while the faction led by Sharad Pawar contested 89 seats but secured only 10. This stark contrast demonstrates that NCP voters overwhelmingly preferred Ajit Pawar as the party’s future leader rather than the veteran Sharad Pawar.Sharad Pawar, who had an opportunity to create third-generation leadership by fielding young, non-dynastic candidates as he had promised, instead relied on the family dynasty—his children and grandchildren. This choice was rejected by the voters, who opted to remain with Ajit Pawar, who is seen as a hands-on leader with a focus on delivery.This outcome has cast a shadow over the political future of Sharad Pawar’s daughter, Supriya Sule, within state politics, particularly in light of Ajit Pawar’s more aggressive approach. Sharad Pawar has often drawn parallels with his political journey in the 1980s, when he lost several MLAs but eventually regained his footing in subsequent elections by bringing in fresh faces. However, in 2024, while Sharad Pawar remained loyal to secular and progressive ideologies, he failed to replicate his past success against his nephew Ajit Pawar and the BJP.On the other hand, Uddhav Thackeray, who had lost both his party and symbol, asked the people of Maharashtra to support him in the state polls against Chief Minister Eknath Shinde. However, the voters chose to stick with Shinde. The Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena contested 79 seats and won 57, while the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena contested 98 seats but only won 20.In the Lok Sabha elections, the Shinde-led party won seven seats out of 15 contested, while Thackeray’s faction won nine out of 21 contested. The Shinde faction garnered 12.38% of the vote share, while Thackeray’s received 10.04%.The state assembly results were a significant setback for the Thackeray brand. Notably, Raj Thackeray’s MNS, led by Uddhav’s cousin brother, also failed to win any seats, including in the Mahim constituency, where his son, Amit Thackeray, lost.If the BJP once again chooses Shinde as Maharashtra’s Chief Minister, it could lead to the remaining Thackeray faction shifting to Shinde’s side. However, if Shinde is not in power, this could provide a window of opportunity for Uddhav Thackeray to revive his political fortunes under the leadership of his son, Aditya Thackeray, who secured a victory in the Worli constituency against former minister and Rajya Sabha MP Milind Deora.
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