It is around midnight, and the phone rings. It is Parth Pawar, calling to apologise. “Sorry, I cannot speak to you now as I am still with party workers, planning my schedule for tomorrow,” says Parth, son of Ajit Pawar, former deputy chief minister, Maharashtra.
Parth is contesting from Maval on a Nationalist Congress Party ticket. While his cousin Rohit is a zilla parishad member, Parth is lucky to have got the opportunity to directly contest the Lok Sabha polls. “I was overwhelmed when I came to know that ajoba (granduncle Sharad Pawar, the NCP chief) decided to opt out (of the elections). I went and told him that I am willing to wait,” Parth later told THE WEEK. “But he said that young people should take charge now and he had made up his mind not to contest (from Madha), and party workers were very keen that I should contest.”
Party workers started approaching him and his father last year. “They told my father that we have never won Maval and the only chance to win it will be when all factions within the party come together.” said Parth. “They said this would happen only if a member of the Pawar family contested from Maval.”
While he grew up in south Mumbai, he “realised the untapped potential of Maval during assembly elections and subsequent Pimpri-Chinchwad municipal corporation elections”. But, his first brush with campaigning was when he was 12. “My grandmother told me to gather the kids in Katewadi and go house to house for my father’s campaign,” he said.
Parth begins his campaign at 9am and ends it at 10pm, addressing 40 meetings in a day. While campaigning, he prefers Maharashtrian food, comprising vegetables or sukka mutton and bhakri or chapatis. “I like Japanese food, but that is only when I am in Mumbai. Otherwise, I am a hardcore Marathi when it comes to food,” he said.
Parth wants to develop his constituency as an industrial hub. “There is a huge scope for industry park, logistics park and even a new film city,” he explained. “Wherever I go, farmers tell me that their produce is not fetching good returns and that their children are jobless. They are tired of the BJP-Shiv Sena government in Maharashtra. I want to make my people happy and work for the all-round development of my constituency.”
Parth is also learning on the job. Coming from a family of orators, he was trolled on social media when he fumbled in his first few public speeches. But, he is taking the criticism in his stride. Also, when he met his rival, Shiv Sena MP Shrirang Barne at the Lord Vitthal temple in Dehu village, he said they shook hands and exchanged pleasantries. “Politics,” said Parth, “should not affect personal relations.”
PARTH PAWAR, 29
EDUCATION
BCom, HR College, Mumbai
POLITICAL LINKS
Granduncle Sharad Pawar is former Union minister and current Madha MP; father, Ajit Pawar, is former deputy chief minister of Maharashtra; aunt Supriya Sule is Baramati MP; and uncle Dr Padmasinh Patil is former Osmanabad MP