Waiting for her Turn

It was not once, but thrice, that Maharashtra came close to having a woman as its chief minister. Destiny—and party calculus—intervened each time.

As January drew to a close, 67 years after the state’s formation, Maharashtra finally saw its first woman deputy chief minister: a grieving Sunetra Pawar. The moment was marked not by celebration but by tragedy. She had lost her husband, the powerful Ajit Pawar, in an aircraft crash just days earlier. Her elevation came less from ceremony and more from political necessity—an effort to steady alliances and hold ranks together. “Situations and party politics determine who the chief minister will be,” says Abhijit Brahmanathkar, former journalist, advocate, and political commentator.

Perhaps the moment simply never aligned before. Pratibha Patil, who would later become India’s first woman President, came close to the coveted post in 1981, only to be edged out by a male colleague. The corridors of power still murmur that as recently as 2019, the state stood on the brink of being led by a woman. Instead, Uddhav Thackeray, Balasaheb’s heir, was anointed CM despite no experience in electoral politics. The two women CM-hopefuls were left out. “It is extremely unfortunate that in a state that swears by the Shiv-Shahu-Phule-Ambedkar legacy and has had visionary leaders like Yashwantrao Chavan, women’s participation in leadership roles has been overwhelmingly low and disappointing,” says Anish Gawande, national spokesperson for the Nationalist Congress Party (Sharad Pawar). “Today, Sunetra vahini is being slandered as just the wife of a DCM taking his place, a placeholder. The invisible labour that women put into politics, whether for themselves or their more public family members, is dismissed and side-stepped when they get into a position of power. But every new woman leader is an opportunity to dispel this mentality,” he says.

Women have long shaped Maharashtra’s political life, often forcefully and visibly. From early trailblazers such as Mrinal Gore, Ahilya Rangnekar, and Pramila Dandavate to Congress leaders from western Maharashtra like Premalakaki Chavan and Shalinitai Patil, they have occupied positions of influence and decision-making across party lines. Yet influence has not always translated into ultimate authority.

Party dynamics, public sentiment, and entrenched patriarchy have conspired to keep women from the state’s top office. Observers point out that the Marathas, who dominated Maharashtra’s political landscape for decades, often anointed sons—not daughters—as heirs. Beyond structural exclusion, safety and workplace culture have also deterred women from pursuing politics as a profession. A senior politician once remarked that the women’s wings of certain national parties were “meant for the entertainment of the male leaders”. Unsurprisingly, those who rise often do so from strong political lineages that provide insulation against harassment. “Women who come with a powerful lineage, don’t have to face this but the common person does. The POSH Act is not applicable to women in politics since a party is not classified as a workplace,” says Gawande.

Perception is another battleground. Women exercising soft power from behind powerful male relatives are accepted—even celebrated. But when they claim authority outright, they are recast as threatening, aggressive, or in need of restraint. Sunetra Pawar’s own trajectory illustrates this shift. In Baramati, she was long seen as the gentle centre of influence—an environmental advocate running NGOs, a patient listener whose reassuring nod signalled grievances were heard, the empathetic intermediary who carried complaints to ‘dada’, the region’s strongman and six-time deputy chief minister. The whispers began the moment she took oath herself.

Parties, however, are taking small steps to put women in leadership roles. Today, the Maharashtra council of ministers includes five women, three of them cabinet ministers. Yet in nearly seven decades, only nine women have ever secured cabinet berths. Others have served as ministers of state, but political lineage remains a common thread among those currently in office.

The Woman Chief Minister Maharashtra Almost Got

As Diwali approached in October 2019, political fireworks rivalled festive ones. Two influential women were positioned to create a political dhamaka, and Maharashtra seemed poised to witness its first woman chief minister. Instead, the moment fizzled—and history paused once more. What endures in political memory is the story of how three powerful women ultimately propelled Uddhav Thackeray, reluctant and unexpected, into the chief minister’s chair.

As results streamed in on October 21, the Thackeray family gathered in the party chief’s second-floor office in Sena Bhavan. It emerged that without the undivided Sena’s numbers, the BJP could not form the government. Negotiations unfolded; the NCP entered the equation. Sena workers floated Rashmi Thackeray’s name should Uddhav resist. NCP circles echoed a parallel possibility—Sharad Pawar’s daughter Supriya Sule could make history as the state’s first woman CM. Both were within striking distance of the top job. But when Pawar emerged from a marathon meeting at the Nehru Science Centre, he named Uddhav as the alliance’s choice. Three influential women, including Sonia Gandhi, had placed a man in the hot seat—and Maharashtra’s wait continued.

This was hardly unprecedented. In 1981, Pratibha Patil—legislator since 1962—was seriously considered for the role by Indira Gandhi. A lawyer from Jalgaon, Patil had already made history as Maharashtra’s first woman Leader of the Opposition in Maharashtra between 1979 and 1980, holding the government accountable through debates and motions. Yet Sanjay Gandhi chose his friend Abdul Rahman Antulay. A year later, Shailinitai Patil, a Congress leader who held considerable influence in the party, was believed to be instrumental in changing the leadership in 1981. At a time when she was seen to have the potential to be the CM, Babasaheb Bhosale assumed office. A politician from Satara says that there were several factors that went against her—her gender at a time when power was held by men, her growing influence that often overshadowed even her husband and fear among senior male leaders that they would have to work under her. “These were three occasions when Maharashtra could have got a woman CM but did not. The situation was not favourable to Shalinitai or Pratibha Patil. In politics, what is convenient is always prioritized, and people from one's own faction are favoured. As a result, both of them were left behind.",” says Brahmanathkar.

India versus Maharashtra

This gap stands in stark contrast to the state’s own social and intellectual heritage. From Jijabai, the visionary force behind the Maratha Empire, to Savitribai Phule and the reformist legacy of Dr B R Ambedkar and Jotiba Phule, Maharashtra’s history is rich with transformative figures—women included. Yet representation at the highest levels remains modest. In 67 years, the state has seen 461 women MLAs and just nine cabinet ministers. Even today, all five women ministers in government hail from political lineages. Only in 2026 did a woman assume the deputy CM’s office—ironically, not a constitutional post.

Elsewhere, trajectories have diverged. Uttar Pradesh produced Sucheta Kriplani as chief minister as early as 1963 and later saw Mayawati lead four times. Delhi has had three women CMs, including one in office now. Few dispute that Jayalalitha and Mamata Banerjee carved paths to power through sheer political combat, while Rajasthan’s Vasundhara Raje and Gujarat’s Anandiben Patel commanded state leadership in their own right. Since Independence, 11 states have entrusted women with executive authority.

Part of Maharashtra’s story lies in historical power consolidation within the Maratha community. Sons inherited the mantle; daughters cemented alliances through marriage. Women became nodal points of influence—wives, mothers, daughters wielding soft power—but rarely autonomous authority. Reservations in local rural and municipal polls have empowered more women to step into electoral politics but there are allegations that many are just proxy candidates for the men in their family. “While that may be true, I believe that after three election cycles, these women assume more independent authority,” says Gawande. He asserts that a safe structural set-up is also needed to groom more women to reach the higher echelons of politics.

“Lack of women at the top is a reflection of our political party structure which did not have enough women karyakartas or office bearers or a truly powerful mahila party organisation. That hasn’t taken off in a big way in Maharashtra,” explains Gawande. He credits Supriya Sule with recognising this gap and founding the Yuvati Congress to nurture young political aspirants, some of whom have already contested municipal polls.

Power-puff women

The women who have made a mark in Maharashtra politics

Supriya Sule

Heir apparent to Sharad Pawar, she shoulders significant political weight with assurance. A Lok Sabha member since 2009, she has repeatedly earned the Sansad Ratna for her participation in debates and motions. National working president of the NCP (SP) since 2023, she remains one of Maharashtra’s most visible women leaders. In 2012, she founded the Rashtravadi Yuvati Congress to open political space for young women.

Pankaja Munde

Her outspoken ambition to become chief minister in 2014 arguably blunted her ascent. As minister for women and child welfare that year, she faced allegations of financial mismanagement in what became known as the ‘chikki scam’. Defeated in the 2024 Lok Sabha race, she returned as an MLC and environment minister. The eldest daughter of Gopinath Munde, she continues to contend with cousin Dhananjay Munde for the inheritance of a formidable political legacy.

Pratibha Patil

The first woman to become the President of India, Pratibha Patil is a lawyer who spent several years in electoral politics, as a legislator from 1962, then served as a Cabinet Minister, Leader of the Opposition and then the Deputy Chairperson of the Rajya Sabha. In 2007, she became the 12^th President of India and is known to have missed the chief minister’s chair by a turn of fate.

Poonam Mahajan

The circumstances of her entry into politics weren’t happy; she joined the BJP after her father’s killing but effectively carved a role for herself as a two-term MP from Mumbai and the National President of Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM), the youth wing of the BJP for four years. An impactful orator in Parliament, Mahajan’s winning spree was abruptly cut short when she was denied a ticket in 2024.

Varsha Gaikwad

Representing a constituency that houses Asia’s largest slum, Dharavi, Gaikwad is a four-term MLA and now an MP from the same constituency that her father Eknath Gaikwad won from, three times. The first woman to be appointed as the president of the Mumbai Regional Congress Committee, Gaikwad is a former cabinet minister

Shalinitai Patil

A formidable presence from politically dominant western Maharashtra, Shalinitai Patil entered public life through the Satara Zilla Parishad before rising to become a cabinet minister. Never content to remain in the shadow of her influential husband and former CM, Vasantdada Patil, she carved her own authority and is widely believed to have played a key role in forcing A R Antulay’s resignation from the chief minister’s post.

Gen Next

Aditi Tatkare

Minister for Women and Child Development, Aditi Tatkare cut her political teeth under the mentorship of her father, Sunil Tatkare, a close aide of Ajit Pawar. Beginning with the Rashtravadi Yuvati Congress, she first tested electoral waters in zilla parishad polls before securing a seat in the state assembly from Shrivardhan in 2019. Her steady rise culminated in a cabinet berth in 2024, marking her as one of the younger faces to watch in Maharashtra politics.

Praniti Shinde

Carrying forward a formidable political legacy, Praniti Shinde entered the Lok Sabha in 2024 after serving three terms in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly. Her political grounding began with NGO work focused on women in Solapur, followed by hands-on campaign experience assisting her mother in 2004. When her father shifted to national politics in 2009, Praniti capitalised on his goodwill to win from a newly carved constituency in Solapur that same year. Today, she is regarded as one of the more vocal women politicians representing Maharashtra within the Congress.

Sana Malik

In the aftermath of the NCP split, as both factions scrambled for viable candidates, Sana Malik was handpicked by Ajit Pawar to contest from Mumbai’s Anushakti Nagar in the 2024 assembly elections. The lawyer-entrepreneur secured victory even as her father, senior NCP leader Nawab Malik, lost his race from the Mankhurd Shivajinagar seat. Seen as inheriting Malik’s political legacy, she represents a new-generation entrant with the potential for a significant future in public life.

Total number of women MLAs: 461

Number of women cabinet ministers: 9

First woman MLA : Pratibha Patil in 1962

Indira Maydeo was elected to the first Lok Sabha in 1952 from Pune