Sharad Pawar’s lunch invite to CM, Dy CMs leaves both rivals, friends wondering: What’s on the menu?

It’s not just the three top state government functionaries who have been left puzzled by the invite, particularly nephew Ajit, who didn’t just take more than half the NCP from Pawar Senior but also the party name and symbol. Those watching on with more than a tad of apprehension include Pawar’s allies Congress and Shiv Sena (UBT), who know better than to take the gesture by the old warhorse at face value.

Pawar has chosen not to offer any reason or explanation, except what he said publicly – that he wanted to give Shinde a traditional welcome as it was his first visit to Baramati in Pune district after becoming CM.

The occasion for which Shinde and his deputies are coming is to unveil an employment scheme, the Namo Maharozgar Yojna, at Baramati. While a similar event was held in Nagpur, Fadnavis’s home town, a couple of months ago, the choice of Baramati is clearly meant to rattle Pawar, with the NDA parties having declared their intention to wrest the Baramati Lok Sabha seat from his family’s control this time.

Besides, while the venue for the function is the Vidya Prathishthan in Baramati, Pawar who heads it and is a Rajya Sabha MP from the state has not been invited for it. The invites have instead gone out to Pawar’s daughter Supriya Sule (the sitting Baramati MP) and fellow NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) MP Amol Kolhe (Shirur).

Incidentally, Pawar’s lunch invite to his rivals came a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi attacked him indirectly during his visit to Yavatmal nearby. Addressing women self-help groups, Modi said: “An agriculture minister from Maharashtra was in the corrupt UPA government, which looted the farmers of Vidarbha and Marathwada regions.”

Shinde, Fadnavis and Ajit are yet to say anything about Pawar’s invite – knowing well that a wrong word here or there could help Pawar look like a statesman and them as ingrates in comparison.

Sule, who is looking at a possible challenge from Ajit’s wife in the Baramati seat, has said her father was only upholding the tradition of ‘Atithi Devabhava (a guest is like god)’. That is hard to argue with given Pawar’s well-earned reputation of being an excellent host, especially to visitors to Baramati, and of a leader who retains the art of breaking bread across parties.

Last year, for example, when Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman was assigned the Baramati Lok Sabha constituency as part of a BJP campaign to strengthen the party organisation, Sule had said the family would be happy to have “Nirmalaji visit our home for lunch”. “We may belong to different parties, but we are not enemies,” she had said.

However, at a time when those distinctions no longer hold, Pawar’s move is being hotly debated in the Mantralaya corridors. Detractors point to the repeated allusions by the NDA parties during the ongoing interim Budget Session that Maratha quota activist Manoj Jarange Patil – who threatened to continue his agitation even after the government had passed an Act providing reservation to the community – was acting at Pawar’s behest.

Fadnavis, who has been the target of Jarange Patil’s attacks, announced in the Assembly an SIT into the claims that the activist had made, including of a threat to his life from the government: “Whose script is Jarange Patil following? All this will be exposed by the SIT investigation.”

Asked if Pawar was trying to buy peace with the Maharashtra ruling parties, as some BJP leaders also told The Indian Express, Jayant Patil said: “Sharad Pawar has always been a stickler for protocol. If the CM and Deputy CMs are in Baramati and he wants to extend courtesy to them by hosting lunch, why should anybody see politics in it?”

Another leader of Pawar’s party pointed out, “Last year, when Sharad Pawar along with party leaders visited Nagpur, Union minister Nitin Gadkari had hosted a lunch for them at his home… There was absolutely no political agenda.”

A leader of the NCP faction led by Ajit admitted they were in a dilemma over the invite. “Every act of Sharad Pawar can snowball into a larger political agenda. By taking the lead in this, he has not only ensured centre stage for himself, but will also earn goodwill in public.”

Vijay Waddetiwar of the Congress, Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly, says Pawar has no need to need to make such truce gestures, adding that the SIT probe should instead reveal “the real mastermind”.

More candid than Waddetiwar, Shiv Sena (UBT) Sanjay Raut says: “Everybody knows at whose behest Jarange Patil is attacking Fadnavis. It is obvious someone wants to emerge as the Maratha leader.” That someone, the Opposition has been claiming, is Shinde, towards whom Jarange Patil has been consistently lenient.

However, it is a senior Congress leader who speaks for most, across party lines, when he says, on the condition of anonymity: “We believe Pawar Senior’s secular credentials. But we are always wary of his politics.”