Until January this year, Parth Pawar occupied an unusual place within the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). He was Ajit Pawar’s son, had lost the 2019 Lok Sabha election from Maval by over 2.15 lakh votes, and sat through meetings of MLAs more as an observer than a participant. Senior leaders say Ajit Pawar rarely involved him in important political decisions and, during the Pune municipal corporation elections, even asked him to stay away from the campaign.
According to party leaders, bureaucrats and associates, few significant organisational decisions are taken without his approval. His influence has grown rapidly after his father’s death in an aircraft crash earlier this year, the elevation of his mother Sunetra Pawar as Deputy Chief Minister and party president, and the vacuum that followed.
For supporters, Parth represents continuity, a son who has shouldered the responsibility of preserving his father’s legacy, throwing himself into everything from organisational appointments to raising resources for the 2029 elections.
For critics, his rise has fundamentally altered the character of the NCP, concentrating decision-making within a small circle, rewarding personal loyalty over seniority and leaving little room for dissent. They point to the growing unease among senior leaders such as Sunil Tatkare and Praful Patel as evidence of a deeper struggle over who controls the party after Ajit Pawar.
As speculation grows over a possible understanding between the Sharad Pawar-led NCP (SP) and the BJP-led NDA, the ruling NCP is battling a crisis of its own. A series of developments over the past fortnight, from Tatkare and Patel meeting Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis without informing Sunetra Pawar, to a legal challenge to her election as party president, Patel’s call for “corrective measures” and renewed merger chatter, has exposed tensions simmering for months.
At the heart of almost every disagreement lies the growing influence of one man. Parth Pawar.
Parth did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
The heir kept waiting
Unlike the NCP, whose political identity was forged in Maharashtra’s cooperative movement and rural politics, Parth Pawar’s upbringing was distinctly urban. Educated at Campion School in Mumbai, he moved to London for a business management course, which remained incomplete, and eventually graduated in commerce after returning to India. Friends and colleagues describe him as a football enthusiast who, until a few years ago, seemed more comfortable outside politics than inside it.
He is the only one among the young Pawars born inside Varsha, the Chief Minister’s official residence, when Sharad Pawar was CM. “The person who took the newborn in arms immediately was his aunt, Supriya,” a family member said, describing a bond that has stayed cordial. When Parth later came under fire in the Pune land deal case, it was Supriya Sule who took a conspicuously neutral stand, declining to attack him directly despite sitting in the Opposition.
His name first surfaced in controversy in 2013, when he and a group of friends were accused of damaging the car of a family member of a senior Mumbai Cricket Association functionary. The complainant alleged Parth had orchestrated the attack. The complaint, filed when Ajit Pawar was Deputy Chief Minister, was subsequently withdrawn.
His 2019 debut proved bruising. His candidature from Maval reportedly triggered reservations within sections of the Pawar family, with Sharad Pawar said to be unconvinced about fielding him. He lost to Shiv Sena’s Shrirang Barne by more than 2.15 lakh votes, the first member of the Pawar family to lose an election.
The setbacks continued. When Parth supported a CBI inquiry into actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s death in 2020, contradicting the party’s position, Sharad Pawar described him as “immature”. Years later, when he criticised the Congress during discussions over an unopposed by-election for Sunetra Pawar, Sharad Pawar again questioned his political maturity.
Although Ajit Pawar rarely entrusted him with political responsibilities, leaders say Parth closely observed the workings of the party. He attended meetings of legislators as a silent spectator, watched how decisions were made, marked who stood with his father and who did not, and gradually built his own network of advisers and loyalists. “He was rarely entertained in political discussions,” recalled a senior NCP leader. “So much so that during the Pune municipal corporation elections, Parth was instructed to remain outside India.”
The turning point, leaders say, came with the split of 2023. When Ajit Pawar walked into the Mahayuti, the other ambitious young members of the Pawar family, Rohit and Yugendra among them, stayed with the Sharad Pawar-led faction. Within the breakaway NCP, Parth suddenly had no generational rival, and his involvement behind the curtain grew, even as his father kept him out of the public political picture.
A new power centre
If Parth remained on the fringes while his father was alive, Ajit Pawar’s death changed that almost overnight.
At Parth’s insistence, party leaders say, Sunetra Pawar remained in active politics after her defeat to Supriya Sule in the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Baramati and was later sent to the Rajya Sabha. After Ajit Pawar’s death, he is also credited within the party with ensuring she was sworn in as Deputy Chief Minister.
Through it all, his mother has been a silent supporter. Whether it was her letter to the Election Commission asking it to disregard correspondence made on the party’s behalf after Ajit Pawar’s death, or the omission of senior leaders from the national executive list, she has never once contradicted her son.
The shift became unmistakable only after January. Supporters describe Parth’s emergence as less a power grab than a response to an unexpected vacuum. Those close to him say the sense of responsibility after Ajit Pawar’s death has overpowered everything else in Parth’s life, that he has dedicated himself to running his father’s party, from raising finances to organisational appointments, with an eye on the 2029 elections.
That responsibility, supporters argue, has also translated into decisiveness. They point to commitments made to leaders such as Zeeshan Siddique and Vikram Kakade. Despite opposition from some senior leaders, Parth held firm through four meetings of the party’s core committee until both were accommodated in the Legislative Council. “It is natural that he will be compared to his father. I feel it is unjustified for Parth as every individual is different in nature. But he too is known for keeping his promises,” an NCP minister said.
To his critics, those very decisions reveal something else. Rather than merely exercising influence, they say, Parth has centralised authority within the organisation, making personal loyalty the principal currency of advancement, an approach described within the party, simply, as “my way or the highway”. “It doesn’t matter whether the leader in front of him is a seasoned politician or very much senior to him. If he feels that the person is going to be a problem for him, he does not hesitate to attempt to weaken him,” a close associate of Parth said.
The Parth method
Those who have dealt with Parth describe a politician who operates very differently from his father. Ajit Pawar built his career on accessibility. MLAs recall walking into his office, raising constituency issues and watching him pick up the phone to a bureaucrat on the spot, an instinctive ability to build personal relationships that became one of his greatest strengths.
Parth prefers small meetings over large gatherings, avoids the media, rarely addresses rallies and conducts much of his political work through one-on-one interactions. Leaders familiar with his functioning say access to him is controlled through a trusted circle of aides, whether at Devgiri, Sunetra Pawar’s official residence, or at offices in Mumbai, Pune and Baramati. That has made him one of the harder politicians in Maharashtra to read.
“We can usually understand how a politician thinks after working with him for a few years,” said a senior bureaucrat who has interacted with him. “I am yet to meet an officer who can confidently say he has decoded Parth Pawar.”
He is also described as someone who places enormous trust in a small circle of advisers. The example most often cited is the now-cancelled Pune land deal involving Amadea Enterprises LLP, in which Parth is a partner. “Ajit Pawar was alive at that time. Had he taken an opinion of a number of revenue cadre officers working with his father then, they would have immediately asked him not to go ahead with that deal. If you don’t listen to anybody outside your coterie, such things are bound to happen,” a senior government officer said.
The old guard pushes back
The unease surrounding Parth remained largely private until the months after Ajit Pawar’s death. Then, one episode after another, the party’s tensions spilled into the open, beginning with its organisational restructuring.
In March, Sunetra Pawar wrote to the Election Commission asking it to disregard any correspondence sent on behalf of the NCP after Ajit Pawar’s death. Around the same time, the party faced criticism after the names of state president Sunil Tatkare and national working president Praful Patel were omitted from the national executive list submitted to the Commission. Although the omission was later called a clerical error, it deepened suspicion among sections of the leadership that an attempt was being made to reduce the influence of the party’s senior-most leaders.
The dispute, leaders say, reflected a larger struggle over control of the organisation after Ajit Pawar. “The moment he realised that there is an attempt to keep the party under their control by introducing changes in party constitution, he ruthlessly sidelined them,” said a young NCP leader who works closely with Parth, referring to Patel and Tatkare. Leaders aligned with the two veterans saw it differently, as an attempt to replace an organisation built through decades of political relationships with one run by a much smaller circle.
The differences soon became harder to conceal. Earlier this month, Tatkare and Patel met Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis after reports that the NCP (SP) could back the NDA on the proposed Delimitation Bill. Sunetra Pawar is learnt to have questioned why she was not informed in advance. The next day, Parth met Fadnavis himself, with sources saying he asked that the Deputy Chief Minister be kept informed of future interactions involving senior NCP leaders.
Around the same time came a legal challenge to Sunetra Pawar’s election as national president, Patel’s public call for “corrective measures”, and a letter from party vice-president Udaykumar Aher alleging that “certain people” were trying to end Parth’s political career and demanding a Union Cabinet berth for him. Leaders say Parth’s sidelining of the two veterans has itself pushed Patel and Tatkare towards reviving talk of a merger.
A party, and a leader, at a crossroads
Despite his influence, Parth remains an unusually opaque figure. He has rarely articulated views on governance or policy and has never given an interview explaining what kind of politics he hopes to practise. That has left even those within his party defining him by method rather than ideology.
Outside the NCP, the watching is cautious. A senior BJP leader called Parth’s rise an internal matter for an alliance partner. “He has not harmed any interest of the Mahayuti and therefore what he does inside the NCP is not a matter of concern for us,” the leader said. The silence on the other side of the family divide is more studied: NCP (SP) spokespersons, when contacted, declined to comment on Parth, saying they would not speak about members of the Pawar family.
Whether the Mahayuti’s comfort lasts may depend on Parth’s ability to convert organisational authority into political legitimacy. For now, much of his influence rests on his father’s legacy and his mother’s confidence.
“Mastering the allegiance of MLAs was Ajit Pawar’s prowess, but Parth has offered nothing but the legacy of his father as of now. Sidelining senior and seasoned leaders while holding discussion with BJP top brass may boost his ego but it will be effective only till he has legislators by his side,” an NCP minister said.
Parth Pawar
(Ilustration Credit: Suvajit Dey) 
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