The surprise development is that Sudakarrao Naik, once Pawar's bete noire, has rallied around to support Pawar on the issue of Sonia's foreign origin. And equally surprising is the silence being maintained by a known Pawar aide, Praful Patel, the beedi magnate from Gondia and a member of dissolved Lok Sabha.

According to available information, Patel met Prataprao Bhonsale, the Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee chief, on Friday and assured him that he would not join Pawar and remain put in the Congress. Another Pawar loyalist and a link-man of the Maratha leader in the union capital, N K P Salve, has reportedly made up his mind to ditch him and remain in the Congress. Ranjit Deshmukh, the former MPCC chief and a close Salve lieutenant, claimed the former union minister has already conveyed his decision to the party high command and differed with theissue raised by the expelled trio on Sonia's ``foreign'' origin.

The Maharashtra minister of state for Education and Cultural Affairs, Anil Deshmukh, a cousin of Ranjit Deshmukh, may switch over to the Congress as his arch rival in the Katol Assembly constituency, Sunil Shinde, has already joined the Pawar camp.

On the other hand, some Congress leaders who left the party during the last state polls, may join the Pawar camp. These include former Maharashtra minister and veteran co-operative leader of Vidarbha, Babasaheb Kedar and his supporters.

Kedar, Independent MLA Ramesh Bang and their supporters held a meeting at Chikhaldara, the lone hill station of the region, yesterday and reportedly decided to support Pawar. Kedar's son, Sunil Kedar, a former minister and another Independent MLA, has already declared that he would join Pawar camp.

Also, on Saturday Nagpur District Congress Committee chief and former legislator, Sudhakarrao Deshmukh, resigned from the primary membership of the Congress inprotest against the expulsion decision. The immediate problem the polarisation would throw up is the choice of candidates for the Lok Sabha polls. The Pawar group is likely to enter into some tacit understanding, if not an alliance, with the BJP and may not put up candidates in some seats where the BJP is strong.

One seat which might create a dilemma for the Congress is the Nagpur Lok Sabha seat, now held by the former union minister Vilasrao Muttemwar.

Muttemwar, who had for a long time belonged to the anti-Pawar camp, had patched up with him recently. Muttemwar is a known protege of Tariq Anwar. This might put under cloud his re-nomination for the Nagpur seat and leave the seat for party legislator, Satish Chaturvedi, a Sonia loyalist and strong detractor of Pawar.

Chaturvedi, has been a contender for Parliament and the vehemence with which he attacked Pawar has only made it more obvious. Insiders say that barring Muttemwar, all Congress members of the dissolved Lok Sabha, who have not joined thePawar camp might be renominated in the region.