KOLHAPUR: A third NCP legislator from Maharashtra’s Satara – Makarand Jadhav-Patil of Wai – joined newly-anointed deputy CM Ajit Pawar, less than a week after being seen siding with party patriarch Sharad Pawar as the latter travelled to Karad and back in a bid to salvage whatever remained of his borough following the split engineered by his nephew.
MLAs Ramraje Naik-Nimbalkar and Dipak Chavan had crossed over before Jadhav-Patil did so last Friday. Hundreds of his supporters from Wai, which comprises three tehsils, followed their leader.
The NCP was split wide open on July 2 after eight MLAs took oath as ministers of the Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis government. Jadhav-Patil had attended the oath-taking ceremony, but the very next day, he welcomed Pawar to Satara and accompanied him on the Karad trip.
A purported video of the meeting between Ajit Pawar and Jadhav-Patil’s supporters shows the latter setting two conditions for switching loyalty – financial help to the debt-ridden Kisan Veer and Khandala sugar factories, and a cabinet berth for the Wai MLA.
Sources said Ajit Pawar and Jadhav-Patil held a closed-door meeting after he formally switched sides.