MAHARASHTRA Deputy Chief Minister and NCP chief Ajit Pawar will emerge as a key player after the November 20 Assembly polls in the State, predicted former Minister Nawab Malik on Sunday. In an interview with PTI over the phone, the NCP candidate from Mumbai’s Mankhurd-Shivajinagar seat said the politics of ideology is over in Maharashtra and nobody knows who will side with which party. “There are even speculations that NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar and Eknath Shinde, who heads the Shiv Sena, will join hands,” he claimed. Malik, who was arrested in a money laundering case and is also accused of having links with people close to fugitive gangster Dawood Ibrahim, is pitted against Samajwadi Party nominee and MVA-backed sitting MLA Abu Azmi and Shiv Sena’s Suresh Patil. Sena and NCP are partners in the Mahayuti coalition, and leaders from the other constituent, BJP, have declared that they won’t campaign for Malik. The BJP has been a trenchant critic of Malik. The 65-year-old politician said the Assembly polls will be a neck-and-neck contest between the ruling Mahayuti coalition and Opposition bloc Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) and NCP chief Ajit Pawar will emerge as a key player after the elections. Of the 288 Assembly seats in the State, the undivided NCP had won 54 seats last time.

 

Ajit Pawar split the Sharad Pawar-founded NCP last year after he and MLAs loyal to him joined Mahayuti. Ajit Pawar subsequently got the party’s name and ‘clock’ symbol. Sharad Pawar now heads the NCP (SP) and is a constituent of MVA, besides Congress and Shiv Sena (UBT). Malik said he is grateful to the then Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and Sharad Pawar for not seeking his resignation as Minister after his arrest in 2022 when MVA was in power. “I have already said I am grateful to them. I spoke to Uddhav ji over the phone after my release from jail and met Pawar saheb personally,” he told PTI. Malik said he is with Ajit Pawar as the deputy CM stood by him during difficult times but did not elaborate. Malik accused his rival and sitting MLA Abu Asim Azmi of being hand in glove with the Government. “He voted for them in the legislative council and Rajya Sabha elections. He controls the local administration in the constituency,” he claimed.