Page 9 - Seniors Today Dec 2019

leaders of other political parties either cancelled
their meetings due to the downpour or had
waterproof shamianas erected for themselves.
In 2004, through the pain of his illness, Pawar
had forged a fresh alliance with the Congress
after splitting from the party in 1999. There
was a BJP government ruling at the Centre and
neither the Congress nor the NCP expected
to win the election. Sonia Gandhi, then the
freshly-minted Congress president, was a
shy novice and no one had any expectations
of her. But Pawar took to the campaign trail
like a whirlwind, hoping to turn the farmers’
vote towards their alliance and hoping the Truly the grand young man of politics
Congress would retain its traditional voter base parties was Sharad Pawar whose party, the
among Dalits and minorities. No one was more Nationalist Congress Party, had virtually been
surprised than the Congress and NCP cadres decimated just ahead of the polls by the BJP
which had engineered a series of defections of
NCP stalwarts and sugar barons who formed
the core base of the party. On the other hand,
the Congress was like a headless chicken, in
a leadership crisis with no one worth his or
her name who could be expected to seize the
reins and lead the party into the campaign.
Sonia Gandhi, herself battling cancer and in
semi-retirement, had had to take over as the
interim party president after the resignation
of her son Rahul Gandhi post the Lok Sabha
debacle of the Congress. She was completely
dependent on Pawar to help the Congress save
face by winning at least a handful of seats in the
assembly.
It was as one-sided an election as any and the
BJP knew it well. Their leaders left the Congress

Strategy is a byword for the wily politician
who sat stunned in jaw-dropping surprise
before their television sets as they found their
alliance sweep past the ruling coalition. They
formed the government that year and stayed in
power at the Centre for a decade.

Primary target
The situation in 2019 was no different, though
in 2004 the Congress-NCP were fighting
from a position of hope and in 2019 they had
almost given up in despair. Once again, the
only man fighting desperately for both the Sharad Pawar commands respect from practically all parties
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