MUMBAI: As Maharashtra prepares for the upcoming Assembly elections, which are due sometime in November, Sharad Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party (NCP-SP) leader Supriya Sule, who is a Member of Parliament from Baramati, shared her reflections on her recent experience in the Lok Sabha elections.

Sule, daughter of veteran leader Sharad Pawar, faced significant competition during the Lok Sabha elections, which led her to doubt her chances of winning. "I fought the LS poll like a 'fakir' and was not sure of victory," she stated, highlighting the challenges she encountered in a politically charged environment.

In a much-talked-about contest, Sule had a tough fight in the Lok Sabha elections against her sister-in-law Sunetra, who is the wife of her estranged cousin Ajit Pawar, the Deputy CM of the state and MLA from the family stronghold Baramati.

Ever since the undivided Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) split in July 2023, when a majority of NCP leaders led by Ajit Pawar joined the Mahayuti alliance, which comprises the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Chief Minister Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena, the politics of the Pune district, considered the bastion of the Pawar family, has seen a major change in dynamics.

After the split, Ajit Pawar was appointed the Deputy CM alongside Devendra Fadnavis in the Mahayuti alliance. The Election Commission (EC) declared his faction as the real NCP. In contrast, Sharad Pawar's faction was named NCP-SP, which was part of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) coalition with the Congress and Shiv Sena-UBT led by Uddhav Thackeray.

In the Lok Sabha elections, Ajit Pawar decided to field his wife Sunetra, backed by the Mahayuti. BJP's national leaders, CM Shinde and Dy CM Fadnavis, campaigned for her; however, Supriya Sule won by a large margin. After the elections, Ajit Pawar candidly admitted on more than one occasion that the decision to field his wife against Sule was not correct. He noted that society doesn't like rifts in families and acknowledged that he made a mistake in fielding his wife, further stating that politics shouldn't enter the home.