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MANY close Sharad Pawar aides are among the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leaders who have aligned with Ajit Pawar, and been sworn in as ministers along with him. But the one whose defection would have hurt the NCP chief the most is Dilip Walse-Patil, who had started his political career as the Maratha strongman’s Man Friday.
The 65-year-old Walse-Patil, son of late Congress MLA Dattatray Walse-Patil, chose an unconventional route to a political career. After completing his law studies with a postgraduate degree from Mumbai’s Government Law College, Patil kept away from electoral politics and instead chose to work as Pawar’s personal secretary, likely on the advice of his father.
In this role, Walse-Patil cultivated a backroom persona with a silent presence, with Pawar Senior as his mentor. After years of working with Pawar, he finally contested elections in 1990 from the Ambegaon Assembly seat in Pune district, and won. Walse-Patil is now a six-term MLA, having retained the constituency without a break.
In 1999, when Pawar parted ways with the Congress to form the NCP, Walse-Patil was in the core team and part of all the decision-making and execution in the party. In the NCP governments that came to power subsequently, he was entrusted with Finance, Energy, and Medical and Higher Education portfolios.
In what was seen as a setback to his political career, the NCP high command in 2009 made him the Speaker of the Maharashtra Assembly — which he remained till 2014 — instead of a Cabinet minister. The decision was a shock to many, as the Speaker is often seen as a retired politician. But Walse-Patil accepted the job and earned the tag of a “strict headmaster”. He focused on maintaining decorum of the legislature and encouraged first-term members to participate actively, by giving them opportunities to speak on the floor of the House.
In 2019, after the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) was formed, he was given the portfolios of the Excise and Labour departments. Eventually, Pawar reposed faith in him by handing over the important Home Ministry, after his predecessor Anil Deshmukh was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate. Interestingly, it was during the time when Maharashtra Police reported to him as the Home Minister that Devendra Fadnavis and Eknath Shinde launched their coup under the noses of the establishment that deposed the MVA government.
Walse-Patil has remained untainted so far, with the BJP not gunning after him, as evidenced by the absence of ED or Income Tax department raids on him. His decision to break away from his mentor was, therefore, a big surprise for everyone.
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