Raosaheb Ramrao Patil, better known as R. R. Patil (16 August 1956 – 16 February 2015), was an Indian politician from the state of

Maharashtra Maharashtra () is a state in the western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. It is bordered by the Arabian Sea to the west, the Indian states of Karnataka and Goa to the south, Telangana to th ...

. He was an MLA for Tasgaon vidhan sabha constituency from 1991 to 2015. He was an important leader of modern Maharashtra. He was a member of the

Nationalist Congress Party The Nationalist Congress Party is one of the List of political parties in India#State parties, state parties in India and is one of the major political parties in Maharashtra Legislative Assembly, Maharashtra with a recognised state party statu ...

. He became

Home Minister An interior minister (sometimes called a minister of internal affairs or minister of home affairs) is a cabinet official position that is responsible for internal affairs, such as public security, civil registration and identification, emergenc ...

of Maharashtra for the second time after the 2009 Maharashtra assembly election victory of the Congress-NCP alliance. He was also the former

Deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra The deputy chief minister of Maharashtra is the deputy head of the executive branch of the Government of Maharashtra and the second highest ranking minister of the Council of Ministers. List of deputy chief ministers Statistics List by de ...

Early life

R. R. Patil, popularly known as "Aaba", (

Marathi Marathi may refer to: *Marathi people, an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group of Maharashtra, India **Marathi people (Uttar Pradesh), the Marathi people in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh *Marathi language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Mar ...

: आबा) was born on 16 August 1957 in the village of Anjani, in the Tasgaon

taluka A tehsil (, also known as tahsil, taluk, or taluka () is a local unit of administrative division in India and Pakistan. It is a subdistrict of the area within a district including the designated populated place that serves as its administrative ...

, Sangli district in the State of Maharashtra. Despite his father being the village head, their financial condition was not good. He completed most of his education under the government scheme of "Earn & Learn". He obtained a B.A. and an LL.B. from Shantiniketan college in

Sangli Sangli (ISO 15919, ISO: ''Sāṁgalī''; ) is a metropolitan town and the headquarters of Sangli District in Maharashtra, in south-western India. It has earned the nickname "Turmeric City of India" for being the hub of the Asia's largest produ ...

Career

Patil was a member of Sangli Zillah Parishad from 1979 to 1990 from Savlaj constituency, then was elected to the

Maharashtra Legislative Assembly The Maharashtra Legislative Assembly (ISO: ''Mahārāṣṭra Vidhāna Sabhā'') is the lower house of the bicameral legislature of Maharashtra state in western India. It consists of 288 members directly elected from single-seat constituenci ...

in 1990, 1995, 1999, 2004, 2009 and 2014 representing Tasgaon, in Sangli district. He became the Chief Whip of the Congress Party in the assembly as well as the chairman of the public accounts committee of the assembly in 1996–97 and 1998–99. After 1999 Maharashtra Legislative Assembly election, he became the Rural Development Minister of Maharashtra in the Congress-NCP coalition government in October 1999. He became the

of Maharashtra on 25 December 2003. After taking charge of Home Ministry, he also sought guardianship of naxal activity affected district

Gadchiroli Gadchiroli ( �əɖt͡ʃiɾoliː is a city and a municipal council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as ...

. Since then, in spite of many naxal attacks, he encouraged natives to support elected government through some developmental work for them. On 1 November 2004, he was sworn in as the

. He was also the chief of the

's Maharashtra unit and NCP legislative party in

. He was a politician in Maharashtra, also christened as 'Mr Clean' in political circles due to his clean image in the erstwhile tainted political party and also due to cleanliness awareness initiatives like "Gadage Baba Swachata Abhiyan" and "Tantamukt Gaon".

Controversy

His comments in the aftermath of the November

2008 Mumbai attacks The 2008 Mumbai attacks, also referred to as 26/11 attacks, were a series of coordinated Islamic terrorism, Islamist terrorist attacks that took place in November 2008, when 10 members of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan-based Islamist terrorist o ...

have drawn severe criticism for downplaying the gravity of the situation. He was quoted as saying, "They (the terrorists) came to kill 5,000 people but we ensured minimal damage". Sources close to him have argued that his comments are being taken out of context and that he did not intend to downplay the grievous attack. He resigned on 1 December 2008 after further remarks on the attacks. When asked at a press conference whether the terror strike was an intelligence failure Patil said, "It is not like that. In big cities like this, incidents like this do happen. It's [sic] is not a total failure." Patil's words drew flak from many quarters. Mumbai residents who saw him say this on television or were told about it by reporters pointed out the irony of politicians making such statements after being provided high security.

Death

Patil died at Lilavati Hospital and Research Centre after a long fight with oral cancer. Patil showed signs of improvement after his initial treatment and was taken off life support in January 2015, but he succumbed to the disease on 16 February 2015. The last rites were performed in Anjani village in Tasgaon area of

district, Maharashtra on 17 February 2015. Patil's funeral was held with state honours, including a 21-gun salute by the Maharashtra government and was attended by the Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis,

Anna Hazare Kisan Baburao "Anna" Hazare (; born 15 June 1937) is an Indian social activist who led movements to promote rural development, increase government transparency, and investigate and punish corruption in public life. He was awarded the Padma Bhu ...

Sharad Pawar Sharadchandra Govindrao Pawar (, pronunciation: Help:IPA/Marathi, �əɾəd̪ pəʋaːɾ born 12 December 1940) is an Indian politician. Pawar served as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra for four terms and in the Union Council of Ministers ...

and other political leaders from various parties.

References

External links

Aaba Patil's Blog
- rediff.com article dated 29 October 2004
"''R R Patil elected new deputy CM of Maharashtra''"
- HindustanTimes.com article dated 29 October 2004

- HindustanTimes.com dated 29 October 2004

-

Mid-Day ''Mid-Day'' (stylised as mid-day) is a morning daily Indian compact newspaper. Editions in various languages including Gujarati and English have been published out of Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore and Pune so far. In 2011, the Delhi and Bangalore ...

article dated 29 October 2004
"''R R Patil to become Maha DyCM''"
-

Times of India ''The Times of India'' (''TOI'') is an Indian English-language daily newspaper and digital news media owned and managed by the Times Group. It is the List of newspapers in India by circulation, third-largest newspaper in India by circulation an ...

article dated 29 October 2004isters of Indian states {{DEFAULTSORT:Patil, R. R. 1957 births 2015 deaths Marathi politicians Deputy chief ministers of Maharashtra Nationalist Congress Party politicians from Maharashtra People from Sangli district Maharashtra MLAs 1990–1995 Maharashtra MLAs 1995–1999 Maharashtra MLAs 1999–2004 Maharashtra MLAs 2004–2009 Maharashtra MLAs 2009–2014 State cabinet ministers of Maharashtra Maharashtra MLAs 2014–2019 Deaths from oral cancer Deaths from cancer in India