Kamal Ghorui
NEW DELHI: A plane carrying Maharashtra deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar crashed in Baramati on Wednesday. Pawar was on board with 4 others and all on board died in the crash. Pawar, 66, was travelling to Baramati to address a Zilla Parishad election rally when the jet, which had departed Mumbai at about 8.10am, lost contact and disappeared from radar shortly before the crash. Alongside the deputy chief minister were two crew members and two staff, including a personal security officer and an attendant.Plane carrying Ajit Pawar crashes in Baramati — Follow live updatesThe Learjet 45, a mid-size business jet chartered to fly Pawar from Mumbai, plunged toward the runway at around 8.45am, according to initial information, before breaking apart and bursting into flames. Footage from the aftermath captures charred aircraft sections, loose papers and mangled parts strewn across the airfield as firefighters worked to control thick smoke rising into the sky.
Police and rescue teams quickly sealed off the site, with footage showing responders navigating through wreckage that lay in pieces across the runway. Superintendent of Police Sandip Singh Gill said that immediately after the impact the aircraft caught fire and those on board were taken to hospital, where they were later pronounced dead.Pawar, a veteran politician widely known in Maharashtra as “Ajit Dada”, had been in Mumbai the previous day for a state infrastructure meeting chaired by Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. He was the longest-serving deputy chief minister of Maharashtra, having held the post across multiple administrations, and was a key figure in state politics and in managing cooperative institutions such as milk unions and sugar federations.
Born in Ahmednagar district in 1959, Pawar had served both as a Lok Sabha MP and as a member of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly on several occasions. His sudden death leaves a significant vacuum in the state’s political leadership and comes at a critical moment in the build-up to regional elections.He is survived by his wife, Sunetra Pawar, a Rajya Sabha member, and their two sons, Parth and Jay. Further details on the cause of the crash are awaited as investigators from the DGCA head to the site to begin a formal inquiry.
