Last Update: May 02, 2023, 5:18 pm IST
File photo of NCP president Sharad Pawar. (Image: PTI)
After announcing his decision to step down as NCP president, Pawar said a panel of senior party leaders would chalk out the future strategy.
Nationalist Congress Party President Sharad Govindrao Pawar on Tuesday announced his decision to step down as party chief after 24 years in the post. Speaking at a book launch of his autobiography in Mumbai, the 82-year-old leader’s dramatic announcement was met with protests from party workers and leaders. He said a panel of senior NCP leaders would chalk out the future strategy.
“I have decided to step down from the post of Nationalist Congress Party president,” Pawar said. He added that he would continue “his political and social work in public life”.
From student politics to becoming chief minister of Maharashtra four times and a decade-long stint as a Union minister, Pawar has been a master of political maneuvering.
Here’s everything about Sharad Pawar’s career so far that makes him an unforgettable face in Indian politics:
- Pawar was active in student politics and always preferred Congress. He started his political journey by joining the Youth Congress in 1958 and became the Pune District Youth Congress President. By 1964, he was a well-known face in the Maharashtra Youth Congress and was in constant touch with top leaders of the grand old party.
- He contested and won his first MLA election from his home constituency Baramati constituency on a Congress ticket and has been a member of the state legislature or parliament since then.
- He founded the NCP in 1999 after breaking away from the Indian National Congress (INC). In the same year, he was diagnosed with oral cancer and underwent surgery in April 2004.
- Pawar has served as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra four times. In 1978, Pawar, then 38, became the youngest Chief Minister of Maharashtra. In 1988, he became the Chief Minister of Maharashtra for the second time. In 1990, he became the Chief Minister for the third time. In 1993, he again became Chief Minister for the fourth time after the then Chief Minister Sudhakarrao Naik stepped down following the riots in Mumbai.
- He has also served as Defense Minister in PV Narasimha Rao’s cabinet and held the portfolio till March 1993. After the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, he became the Union Agriculture Minister in the Manmohan Singh-led central government.
- Pawar, who hails from Baramati town in Maharashtra, is a prominent face in state politics and was a key figure in bringing together an unlikely alliance of NCP, Congress and Shiv Sena (Uddhav Thackeray) to form the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government. in the 2019 state assembly elections.
- Apart from politics, Pawar served as the chairman of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) from 2005 to 2008 and as the President of the International Cricket Council (ICC) from 2010 to 2012. He was also the chief of the Mumbai Cricket Association from October 2013 to January 2017.
- In 2017, he was awarded the Padma Vibhushan, India’s second highest civilian honour.
- In June 2020, Pawar was re-elected to the Rajya Sabha.
- During the campaign for the 2019 Maharashtra by-election, Pawar made a historic speech in Satara amidst heavy rains. Drenched in rain, the NCP chief refused to take an umbrella while continuing his speech from the dais, saying a leader should not cover himself when his party workers are braving the rain. The speech turned the game in the bypolls as Pawar significantly ate into the vote share of the BJP and the Congress.
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