Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Sharad Pawar celebrated his 84th birthday on Thursday in the presence of family, well-wishers, and party members at his residence on 6, Janpath.
Among those who extended their birthday greetings were Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, and NCP leader Ajit Pawar, the estranged nephew of Sharad Pawar.
Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Sharad Pawar celebrated his 84th birthday on Thursday in the presence of family, well-wishers, and party members at his residence on 6, Janpath.
Among those who extended their birthday greetings were Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, and NCP leader Ajit Pawar, the estranged nephew of Sharad Pawar.
Ajit Pawar, who split from the senior leader last year and led a decisive defeat of Sharad Pawar in the recent Maharashtra assembly polls, attended the celebration with his family and told the media that "some relations are beyond politics".
The senior politician, a former Union Minister, marked the occasion by cutting a birthday cake with a sword.
Born on December 12, 1940, Pawar took the political plunge while in college and became a protege of veteran Congress leader Yashwantrao Chavan.
A four-term Maharashtra chief minister, the senior Pawar has also served as Defence Minister and Union Agriculture Minister.
Pawar parted ways with the Congress in 1999 over the issue of the foreign origin of Sonia Gandhi to form the Nationalist Congress Party.
Ajit Pawar visited Sharad Pawar at his official residence as a parliamentarian in Delhi. He was accompanied by senior NCP leaders Praful Patel, Chhagan Bhujbal and Sunil Tatkare, along with his wife Sunetra and elder son Parth.
This was the first time Ajit Pawar met senior Pawar personally and wished him birthday since the NCP split into two faction in July, 2023.
Ajit Pawar spoke to reporters after the meet and said, "Some relations are beyond politics. Politics is also not only about criticism. Yashwatrao Chavan (first chief minister of Maharashtra) has taught us how to do cultured politics and we try to follow him."
"We also had general discussions on several issues, right from Parbhani violence to Parliament disruption, state cabinet expansion among others," he added.
Bhujbal told PTI, "We came today to wish him (Sharad Pawar) on his birthday,” as he once a close confidant of the former Maharashtra chief minister.
Pawar's grandnephew, Yugendra Pawar, who had run in the assembly elections against Ajit Pawar from their family bastion Baramati, said the visit was a family matter and not related to politics. Ajit won the seat in the legislative assembly elections. Meanwhile another Pawar vs Pawar fight was witnessed during Lok Sabha between Sharad Pawar's daughter Supriya Sule and Ajit Pawar's wife Sunetra Pawar contested Baramati and Sule won it.
In July 2023, the NCP witnessed a split with more than two-thirds of the party MLAs supporting Ajit Pawar, who joined the Shiv Sena-BJP government as deputy chief minister.
Later, the Election Commission recognised the Ajit Pawar-led group as the real NCP and asked the Sharad Pawar-led faction to select a new name for the party and an election symbol.
In the Maharashtra assembly elections last month, the BJP-led MahaYuti coalition comprising Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena, Ajit Pawar-led NCP trounced the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) of Congress, Shiv Sena-UBT and NCP-SP.
The MahaYuti won 235 seats, while the opposition alliance was restricted to 46 seats in the 288-member assembly.