On Wednesday, when Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar decided to land in Baramati around 8.45 am, the first thing he wanted to do was meet his mother at her home in Katewadi and then proceed to campaign for the party candidates contesting the Zilla Parishad elections.
Fate wanted the opposite. Ajit Pawar died in a plane crash at the Baramati airport along with four other people, including the pilot and co-pilot.
“I received a call from Ajitdada around 7am. He asked me to come to the airport as he wanted to hand over some election-related documents. He told me that he would land at 8.45am and would first head to Katewadi to meet his mother. He then said he would campaign at four places till 6pm,” said NCP leader Kiran Gujar, whose association with the Pawar family goes back four decades.
Whenever Ajit Pawar came to Baramati, he would go to his house in Katewadi and spend half an hour with his mother. “Even when he was very busy, he used to meet his mother. If it was not possible for him to meet her for half an hour, he would at least be with her for five minutes. On days when he was not busy, he would meet his mother, spend time with her and then visit her farm located nearby,” Gujar said.
After Ajit Pawar called him in the morning, Gujar wasted no time in reaching the airport with a couple of party workers and Ajit Pawar’s staff. They had stationed themselves at one end of the track. “At 8:45 we sighted the plane. It took one round during which it flew at high speed. In the second round, we thought its speed would reduce before landing. However, it flew at maximum speed and suddenly made two turns in the air and then fell to the ground. It did not land on the runway,” he said.
Gujar said they all quickly got into their vehicle and went to the spot. “We saw thick smoke coming out of the plane amidst the fire. And then the first explosion occurred. A body was thrown out of the plane. I was just a few meters away. I immediately recognized Ajitdada’s body… Although his body was mangled, it didn’t take me time to recognize him because I know him closely. For more than four decades,” he said.
Gujar said there were election-related documents around Ajit Pawar’s body. “The file was seen near the chair. The election-related documents were near his body… It was all over in three minutes. There was smoke, fire and explosions. The body was lying in front of me, but my mind was not ready to accept that our leader was no more,” said Gujar, who had been handling all the party work in Baramati and implementing Ajit Pawar’s directives.
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Talking about Ajit Pawar’s ambition to become chief minister, Gujar said, “It is true that Ajit Pawar wanted to become chief minister. But that was because he wanted to show the people what he can do for them, for the state of Maharashtra. He always said that as an MLA, as a minister and as a deputy chief minister, he had proven himself. And now he should be given the opportunity to go the extra mile for the people. Ajitdada wanted nothing for himself. He was a giver and wanted to do good to the people of Maharashtra.”
Meanwhile, Ajit Pawar’s ashes were immersed at the confluence of Nira and Karha rivers in Baramati on Friday. His sons Parth and Jay collected the ashes from the funeral site at Vidya Pratishthan plot in Baramati town today, a day after the funeral. Sitting in a small boat, the Pawar family members immersed the ashes at the Nira-Karha confluence.
After Ajit Pawar’s ashes were immersed, in an emotional post on social media, his nephew and MLA Rohit Pawar on Friday said that his uncle’s death had numbed his mind and frozen his heart.
“Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that the time would come to collect Ajitdada’s ashes from the same place where he cultivated a development garden. However, fate had other plans…” he wrote.
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Rohit Pawar said that since the news of Ajit’s demise, his mind has gone numb. “My heart is frozen like ice. The storm of thoughts (what happened, how and why) just won’t stop. Every conversation we had, every argument, especially the emotional talks these past few days, keeps playing in my ears like a loop recorder. It feels like you’re speaking to me invisibly.”
The MLA said that everyone was really amazed by Ajit Pawar’s working style. “His firm control of the administration, his strong command of politics and his direct nature. He never played political games; he said ‘yes’ to yes and ‘no’ to no, always telling the truth.”
“But what happened so suddenly? How can a man like a mountain, who just two days ago was driving the chariot of Maharashtra, helping hundreds of people daily, obsessed with development from dawn to dusk and running at the speed of the wind for the common man, disappear in a single moment? My mind is shattered by this question. They say some questions have no answers,” he said.
Rohit Pawar said he had a complaint against Ajitdada. “For two days, Maharashtra has been paralyzed. The stream of tears in everyone’s eyes does not cease. The sound of sobs and cries of pain pierce the heart. Dada, why didn’t you worry about the currents of pain that you would leave behind? Usually, if someone made even a small mistake, Ajitdada would scold him in front of everyone, so why didn’t he rebuke fate in the same authoritative voice? When so much of Maharashtra’s work is still unfinished, “How dare fate come without an appointment?”
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“Today, while collecting his ashes, Rohit Pawar, said that he felt that, like a Phoenix, Ajitdada would suddenly rise from the ashes in his usual style and tell us in his characteristic deep voice: “Hey, fools, why are you shedding tears? I was just playing a joke on you! He was testing their readiness to deal with a crisis, like a drill drill. Now get up, get to work… we have a lot to do for Maharashtra and its common people. Come on, don’t be late.”