PUNE: NCP chief Sharad Pawar on Sunday met family members of the longest-serving MLA in Maharashtra Ganpatrao Deshmukh, who died last month, and expressed condolences.
Deshmukh (94), a senior leader of the Peasants and Workers Party (PWP), breathed his last in a private hospital in Solapur on July 30.
"I couldn't attend Deshmukh's last rites due to Assembly sessions. I strongly wanted to come to Sangola since then," Pawar told reporters. Deshmukh had represented the Sangola constituency in the Solapur district in the state legislative assembly 11 times since 1962.
He had served as an MLA for 54 years.
He had won the Sangola seat in the 2014 state elections for a record 11th time.
Deshmukh had served as a minister in the government led by Sharad Pawar in 1978 and again in 1999 when his party PWP supported the Congress-NCP alliance.