Currently lodged at Pune's Yerawada Central Prison on an attempted murder charge, Gawli chose to submit his nomination papers through a lawyer. It was a low key affair at the District Collectorate with ABS workers not attempting any show of strength.

The nomination papers were filed a day before the hearing of Gawli's bail application at the District and Sessions Court.

Around the time the city was witnessing the tussle between BJP leaders Anna Joshi and Pradip Rawat over the ticket for the Pune LS seat, Gawli's lawyer walked into the office of the returning officer for Khed constituency and submitted the nomination papers. Five minutes later, he was gone.

Officials from the election branch of the District Collectorate said the nomination papers had on them the signatures of Gawli and that of a proposer. Moreover, they were attested by a Yerawada jail officer.

Yerawada Central Prison Superintendent Ramrao Chaudhari said Gawli's lawyers had visited the don and taken his signature on the nomination papers on Wednesday afternoon.

The jail staff, according to Chaudhari, allowed the lawyers to meet Gawli and obtain his signatures on the nomination papers as they had with them the written permission from the magistrate at Ghodegaon.

He said the jailer, who was present during the meeting, had signed on the nomination papers to attest that the signatures were made in his presence. According to Chaudhari, the jail staff has the legal authority to make such attestations.

Gawli was arrested on August 10 night together with his father-in-law Shaikh Lal Mujawar, brothers-in-law Nandu and Baba, and 170 ABS workers after a team of Pune rural policemen was attacked outside Mujawar's bungalow at Wadgaon Paanchpir village, some 100 km from Pune.

The police team had gone to search the bungalow where Gawli had been camping on a tip-off that weapons had been brought there from Mumbai in two vehicles.

Gawli, Mujawar and Nandu were remanded to police custody till August 13 after they were produced before the magistrate at Ghodegaon. When they were produced the second time, the magistrate remanded Gawli to judicial custody until August 24.