Baramati will see one-sided contest, undercurrent strongly in favour of Supriya Sule, says Sharad Pawar’s longtime friend
Vitthal Maniyar, whose family is in the steel business, said Ajit Pawar’s campaigning makes it appear “like his wife Sunetra should have no problem winning” but the people are with Supriya Sule.
Contrary to wide expectations that the 2024 Lok Sabha polls in Baramati will witness a humdinger of a contest, Vitthal Maniyar, a longtime friend of Nationalist Congress Party-SP national chief Sharad Pawar, strongly believes that it will be a one-sided affair, heavily in favour of Supriya Sule.
“Whatever some people might say, whatever the media projects, it is not going to be a close contest. It will be a one-sided affair with Supriya Sule emerging victorious hands down,” Maniyar, who has been Pawar’s friend since his days at BMC College in Pune city, told The Indian Express on Saturday. Maniyar and Pawar were classmates at BMCC from 1958 to 1962.
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Maniyar, whose family is in the steel business, has been closely tracking Sharad Pawar and his politics for decades and freely articulating his views. The 85-year-old said he can sense a big undercurrent in favour of Sule. “The way Ajit Pawar is going about his campaigning, it looks like his wife Sunetra Pawar should have no problem winning. Ajit Pawar has his reasons to go the way he is going… His aggressiveness has much to do with the government machinery, his party’s support base and the support from his allies,” Maniyar said.
“But in reality, though the party workers are with Ajit dada, the people are with Supriya Sule. The people of Baramati have taken the election in their hands and they will ensure her victory… There is a big undercurrent which you can sense in Baramati… That is why I am saying this is not tough, but the easiest election for Pawar saheb since 1967 when he first contested.”
Maniyar said he has been talking to several citizens, young and the old, activists, traders and businessmen. “People say they will not compromise when it comes to representation in the Parliament. Supriya Sule has 15 years of experience in Parliament. She has raised several people’s issues in the Lok Sabha. She knows what to say on national issues. As a member of the Opposition, she has grilled the government several times and is playing her role to perfection.”
“Now she is a mature politician. She is the correct representative of the people in Parliament. So people will choose her… On the other hand, Sunetra Pawar has not even been a member of the Zilla Parishad or the civic body. I am not underrating her, but Sunetra is yet to prove herself. People don’t know her capacity. And her capacity cannot be tested as an MP,” he explained.
Sule, said Maniyar, has not lagged behind when it comes to ensuring the development of Baramati. “She has the backing of Sharad Pawar who is, in fact, Maharashtra’s MP. When you have such a solid support who has worked tirelessly for Maharashtra, you cannot lag behind. You will always remain in the forefront…,” he added.
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Maniyar said there is no logic in Ajit Pawar’s appeal to the people to choose an MP who belongs to a ruling party at the Centre. “Ajit says this can ensure faster development. By that yardstick, does he mean to say that all 543 MPs should be from one party to ensure development? There is no logic in what he says… How can he even talk like this?”
About his recent conversation with Sharad Pawar, Maniyar said, “After the Warje rally earlier this week, I met Pawar saheb and told him about the impact Uddhav Thackeray’s speech had on the audience. He was holding a dialogue with the crowd which went down well with them. The crowd of nearly 20,000 was responding to Uddhav’s speech. I told Pawar saheb that this indicates that things were in favour of Supriya Sule. He reacted, saying ‘very good’.”
What if Supriya loses? Maniyar responded, “If Supriya loses, she will keep working for the people. She is a fighter and a hardworking people’s representative. Even Pawar saheb lost power and had to sit in the Oppostion. Did he stop working for the people? He did not. In fact, in the Opposition, he is more energetic and pillories the government on every false step. Similarly, I am sure, Supriya will not sit at home, she will continue to work for the common man.”
Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.
Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives.
Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees.
During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa.
Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died.
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