Pune: After their initial reluctance to contest the assembly elections following the party's debacle in the LS poll earlier this year, NCP bigwigs Ajit Pawar , Chhagan Bhujbal , and Dilip Walse Patil are now officially in the Nov 20 Maharashtra battle of ballots. Their names were in the first list of 38 candidates NCP released Wednesday. In its first list, NCP nominated 32 incumbent MLAs.
Among them, party chief Ajit Pawar will defend his bastion of Baramati, while cabinet minister Bhujbal will once again contest from Yeola, his stronghold. Walse Patil, another senior NCP member and a cabinet minister who was unwell during the Lok Sabha elections, will contest the assembly polls from his bastion in Pune's Ambegaon. The NCP leadership gave tickets to 12 candidates in western Maharashtra, 11 in north Maharashtra, six in Marathwada, five in Vidarbha, and two each in Konkan and Thane.
After the split in NCP, the Ajit Pawar-led NCP's maiden electoral test was the Lok Sabha elections, which it fought as a Mahayuti ally. The party contested four seats, including the Pawars' bastion Baramati, where Ajit Pawar's wife Sunetra lost to sister-in-law Supriya Sule. NCP also fielded candidates in Raigad, Shirur, and Osmanabad.
NCP could win only Raigad, where the party's state president Sunil Tatkare managed to secure his seat. Following the electoral debacle, most senior NCP members were reluctant to throw their hats in the assembly poll ring. During one of the rallies in Baramati, party c.
