Jeeva Pandu Gavit is a leader from Maharashtra. He belongs to the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and is a seven-time member of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly representing Surgana and Kalwan constituencies. He was elected Protem Speaker of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly in 2014 and was the only leftist member of the 13th Legislative Assembly in Maharashtra. Gavit started his political career as a farmers’ rights advocate and became a member of the Kisan Sabha. A staunch communist, Gavit was first elected to the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly from Surgana constituency in 1978 on a Communist Party of India (Marxist) ticket and defeated his rival Chavan Harichandra Devram by four hundred votes.
After this, in the next assembly elections held in 1980, Gavit won against Indian National Congress candidate Bhoye Sitaram Sayaji by about eighteen hundred votes. In the 1985 elections, Gavit defeated Kahandole Jamru Manglu, the candidate of the ruling party of the Indian National Congress, by more than twelve thousand votes. In the next 1980 assembly election, a confident Gavit and by now a three-term member of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly challenged Bhoye Sitaram Sayaji of the Indian National Congress, whom he had defeated in the 1980 election. The result remained the same and Gavit won by a margin of more than sixteen thousand votes.
This victory sent him to the Assembly for the fourth time. When the 1995 assembly elections were held, Gavit was facing a seventeen-year anti-incumbency wave and lost to Harishchandra Devaram Chavan, an independent candidate, by a huge margin of about twenty-seven thousand votes. In the next Maharashtra Assembly elections of 1999 and 2004, Gavit defeated Harishchandra Devram Chavan both times, who had by now joined Sharad Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party. By eleven thousand votes and defeated Shiv Sena’s Bhaskar Gopal by fourteen thousand votes respectively. Due to delimitation by the Election Commission of India in 2009, Gavit had to change his assembly constituency and leave his reserved seat of Surgana to contest from a newly formed constituency called Kalwan.
The 2014 elections were a referendum for the ruling Congress and the Nationalist Congress because of fifteen years of anti-incumbency and Gavit defeated Arjun Tulsiram Pawar by a slim margin of about four thousand votes. Gavit is credited with introducing the “Doorstep Ration” scheme, which he devised in 2005 to curb corruption in the public distribution system. The scheme has now been replicated in neighboring tribal districts as well. Under this scheme, villagers collect three months’ worth of ration money and deposit it at the rationing office, which then ships the grains directly to the village through ration shops.
Interestingly, Gavit was merely an assistant in the Employment Guarantee Scheme when he entered social life by participating in the movement led by Godavari Parulekar after the 1972 drought. He later contested the election from Surgana constituency (which was dissolved in 2008) on a CPI(M) ticket and had his deposit forfeited along with all the candidates. “However, he was declared the winner as he got the highest number of votes among all, over 7,000. Since then there has been no looking back,” laughs Dr Ashok Dhawale. Gavit has studied till 12th and according to his affidavit given to the Election Commission, he has assets worth Rs 1.66 crore. It also mentions seven criminal cases pending against him. But his supporters don’t care about these “frivolous allegations” as long as he delivers on his promises, which now include bringing industries to the region so that people don’t migrate to cities for livelihood in the non-harvest season. Don’t do it.