NEW DELHI: Will Sharad Pawar’s NCP(SP) support BJP’s Delimitation Bill if the NDA government decides to bring it again in the monsoon session of Parliament? While speculations do the rounds, the Maratha strongman remains conspicuously silent and lets his actions keep everyone guessing. So, while on Tuesday Sharad Pawar joined forces with the opposition at Jantar Mantar where students are protesting against NEET paper leak and seeking education minister Dharmendra Pradhan’s resignation, on Wednesday he was meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi along with his daughter MP Supriya Sule.In June, there were several reports to suggest that Sharad Pawar’s NCP(SCP) could be considering a merger with the Congress to prevent any possible poaching of his legislators. A month later in July, there are strong speculations that Sharad Pawar is leaning towards the NDA to secure the future of his party in the twilight years of his politics.Does this come as a surprise? Well. definitely not. When it comes to politics of ambiguity, no one can beat Sharad Pawar – who is known to keep his cards close to his chest. And that perhaps explains why there is suspense around the line his party could possibly take on the Delimitation Bill.His daughter Supriya Sule, who is MP from Baramati, has rejected all speculations on backing or joining the NDA and has maintained that the party is yet to take any stand on the Delimitation Bill. But her remark last week: “if the proposed Delimitation Bill- a key legislative agenda of the NDA government- is based on a uniform 50 per cent increase in seats across all states, there would be little reason to oppose it.” has already set tongues wagging.

Pressure to keep his flock together

Sharad Pawar has at present 8 members in Lok Sabha and 10 MLAs in Maharashtra assembly. With the NDA government working aggressively behind the scenes to reach the magic figure of two-thirds majority in Lok Sabha for the Delimitation Bill, Sharad Pawar knows that his MPs are vulnerable. He has just seen Uddhav Thackeray helplessly lose his 6 MPs to Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena. Both Uddhav Thackeray and Sharad Pawar have suffered coups that split their parties vertically. While Shinde revolted against Uddhav and took control of the Shiv Sena, in NCP the revolt was led by the late Ajit Pawar, who rebelled against his uncle Sharad in 2023 and wrested control of the party.After a dismal show in the 2024 assembly elections, Pawar knows that his politics and influence is on the wane and his legislators could be lured with promises of greener pastures. Seen in this context, Sharad Pawar’s silence and his mixed signals could be a weapon to keep his legislators hopeful and guessing about his next moves.

The balancing act

Those who have followed Sharad Pawar’s politics, will recount many such instances when he used his power of silence to convey mixed signals to opposing camps. A recent such example was in 2019 when Sharad Pawar was trying to stitch anti-BJP front in Maharashtra with Uddhav Thackeray’s Shiv Sena and the Congress, while on the other hand, at the same time, his nephew Ajit Pawar was negotiating with the BJP. The two-track politics eventually resulted in a pre-dawn swearing-in of Devendra Fadnavis as chief minister and Ajit Pawar as deputy chief minister. However, the government was short-lived as Sharad Pawar was forced to dump Ajit Pawar then. But questions were raised even then if Sharad knew about Ajit’s moves and had allowed both the channels to progress simultaneously. Years later, Sharad Pawar dropped enough hints to suggest that he actually knew about the Track 2 manoeuvres by his nephew then.So while Sharad Pawar remains silent, let’s analyze some of the developments in the recent past to understand his politics of ambiguity.

These developments triggered speculations around NCP(SCP)’s possible support to Delimitation Bill or the possible merger of the two NCP factions (one led by Sharad Pawar and the other led by Sunetra Pawar, wife of late Ajit Pawar) at the behest of the BJP. As expected, Sule denied both. “Neither the BJP nor the Congress nor any NDA ally has contacted us. When there is no proposal, the question of merger or joining any alliance does not arise,” the Baramati MP said. She also denied any political planning behind these developments and labelled them as “courtesy visit”, “unexpected meeting” and “coincidence”. Sule claimed that the NCP(SCP) chief’s meeting with Shinde was “purely a coincidence”. On NCP (SP) leader Jayant Patil’s meeting with Fadnavis, she said Patil had officially sought an appointment to raise the issue of action taken against a municipal council president belonging to the Sharad Pawar-led party.Sule has also dismissed reports that party MPs and MLAs were under pressure to join the ruling alliance and claimed that all eight NCP (SP) MPs firmly rally behind party chief Sharad Pawar. “We meet regularly. None of our MPs or MLAs has told me that they want to take a different political stand. Everyone is happy where they are,” she said.

When Sharad Pawar differed with allies

Sharad Pawar is known for breaking ranks with allies and taking independent stands. When all regional parties were determined to isolate Congress and make a third front excluding both BJP and Congress, it was Sharad Pawar who said that any opposition alliance without Congress would not be effective. Similarly, it was Sharad Pawar who once advocated that regional parties that were born out of Congress should consider “ghar wapsi”.Just as Pawar broke ranks to back Congress on some occasions, he did the same to back Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the NDA government on other occasions. Often, Pawar’s praise for PM Modi and his policies have generated political buzz. While all opposition parties, including the Congress, were targeting PM Modi over his many foreign trips, Sharad Pawar had a different take. In May this year he praised the Prime Minister for working to uphold India’s prestige on the global stage. “Political differences should not come in the way when it comes to protecting India’s prestige, and PM Modi is working to uphold the country’s honour abroad,” Pawar stated.

‘If you are being discussed … ‘

While it may not be easy to comprehend what guides Sharad Pawar’s politics of silence, this one remark from his daughter Supriya Sule perhaps gives some insight into his thought processes. Responding to constant media scrutiny, the Baramati MP recently invoked a lesson from her father and said: “Sharad Pawar always says that if you are being discussed — whether for good or bad reasons — it means your political currency is still strong and sound.“That explains why it has always been difficult to predict the politics of Sharad Pawar. His politics of silence and his art of conveying mixed signals to friends and foes are perhaps his weapons to keep all possibilities open – for we all know there are no permanent friends or permanent enemies in politics.