Lok Sabha polls: Prestige battle for Ajit Pawar as he makes Shirur personal

SHIRUR: After Baramati, if there is any constituency that Ajit Pawar has taken a keen interest in, it is Shirur. This contest is seen as a personal one for Ajit as the Sharad Pawar faction of NCP has repeated its MP Amol Kolhe against Ajit's NCP candidate Shivajirao Adhalrao Patil.

Kolhe, an actor famous for the role of Maratha warrior King Shivaji in tele serials, was present at Raj Bhavan when Ajit rebelled and took oath along with 8 NCP MLAs to join hands with BJP government.

Kolhe, however, changed sides within two days which was taken as a personal insult by Ajit. The latter has since then publicly vowed to ensure that Kolhe will be defeated. The Ajit faction has given a ticket to Shivajirao Adhalrao Patil, a former three term MP from Shiv Sena, defeated in 2019 by Kolhe.


Adhalrao, who was with Eknath Shinde faction of Sena, joined the NCP (Ajit faction) when he realised that the Shirur seat was given to the Ajit camp. Ajit has, so far, held close to a dozen rallies in the constituency. "Within two years after winning the elections, he came to me and said that he is a celebrity and that he needs to work again as he had financial issues and he wants to resign as an MP. I told him how he could resign so soon as people would be very angry," said Ajit in one of his speeches. Ajit claimed that Kolhe abandoned the constituency after winning it.

Interestingly, the actor-turned-politician has announced that if elected to Parliament, he would not act in serials/films for the next five years. While it may seem that Kolhe is swimming against the tide as a majority of the MLAs are with Ajit and BJP, however, on the ground there is a keen contest brewing. "We are unhappy with the rise in prices, prices of seeds and farm equipment have gone up but the price of our produce has not gone up," said Ravikant Mhatre, a farmer from Shirur.

While farmers complain about inflation and a fall in prices of farm products, others are unhappy that Kolhe has not resolved much of the problems. The urban parts of the constituency like Bhosari- Hadapsar and those travelling around the MIDC-Chakan road are complaining about lack of proper infrastructure. "Five years back, he (Kolhe) had promised that roads would be widened, flyovers would be built, Chakan MIDC road sees heavy vehicles being used which causes a lot of traffic jams. However, nothing has been resolved," said Kiran Shewale.

The factor going in favour of Adhalrao, besides the might of Ajit Pawar behind him, is that he also has kept in touch with the constituency for the last five years.