Mumbai: Sunetra Pawar, Rajya Sabha MP and wife of Ajit Pawar, is set to be appointed as the Deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra on Saturday, even as uncertainty continues over a possible merger between the two rival factions of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).
NCP legislators will meet in Mumbai on Saturday afternoon to elect Sunetra Pawar as the leader of the legislature party. She is scheduled to take oath at Raj Bhavan at 5 pm the same day.
Senior NCP leaders, including working president Praful Patel, state president Sunil Tatkare, Chhagan Bhujbal and Dhananjay Munde, reportedly met Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Friday and informed him of the decision. The party has conveyed that Sunetra Pawar will retain key portfolios earlier held by the late Ajit Pawar, including finance, excise and sports.
Preparations for the legislature party meeting are underway, with NCP MLC Sanjay Khodake formally reserving a hall at Vidhan Bhavan for the gathering. Party leaders said MLAs were contacted to seek their views, and Sunetra Pawar, along with her sons Parth and Jay Pawar, is expected to attend the meeting.
The decision follows the death of Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar in a plane crash earlier this week. His passing has triggered rapid political developments within the NCP, which is part of the BJP-led Mahayuti government.
Meanwhile, Sharad Pawar, founder of the NCP and head of the Nationalist Congress Party–Sharadchandra Pawar faction, said in a press conference that the decision to appoint Sunetra Pawar was taken by the party and not in consultation with the Pawar family. He said he came to know about the swearing-in plan through media reports and described the development as separate from family considerations.
Sharad Pawar also indicated that talks to merge the two NCP factions have stalled following Ajit Pawar’s death. He said discussions on reunification, which had been underway for several months, were interrupted and that leaders from the Ajit Pawar camp now appear reluctant to move forward.
He noted that Ajit Pawar had played a central role in the merger talks and had proposed February 12 as a tentative timeline. With his death, Sharad Pawar said, the process has lost momentum, even though his faction remains open to unity.
The NCP split in July 2023, when Ajit Pawar led a breakaway group to join the BJP-led government. Since then, both factions have functioned separately, though they briefly came together during recent municipal elections.
As Sunetra Pawar prepares to step into a key constitutional role, the party faces a dual challenge of ensuring stability within the government while navigating unresolved questions about its future unity.
