As Maharashtra heads to the polls today for elections to 29 municipal corporations, the spotlight is firmly on Mumbai, where the BJP led Mahayuti is locked in a keen contest with the united Thackeray cousins, Raj and Uddhav, for control of the cash rich Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation.
Polling for 2,869 seats spread across 893 wards will begin at 7.30 am and end at 5.30 pm. A total of 3.48 crore voters are eligible to decide the fate of 15,931 candidates. In the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation, whose annual budget exceeds Rs 74,400 crore, nearly 1,700 candidates are contesting for 227 seats in elections being held after a delay of 4 years.
Election mechanics and schedule
Except for Mumbai, all other urban bodies have multi-member wards. Counting of votes for all 29 municipal corporations will take place on January 16. The civic polls are being held after a gap of over 6 years, as the terms of these bodies ended between 2020 and 2023 due to a series of legal and administrative delays.
The elections are widely being seen as a mini assembly battle that will test the organisational strength of the split factions of the Shiv Sena and the Nationalist Congress Party, along with the electoral prowess of the ruling Mahayuti and the Congress.
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, who spearheaded the campaign for the BJP led Mahayuti, has predicted that Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray would emerge as the biggest loser from his alliance with cousin and Shiv Sena UBT president Uddhav Thackeray. He also dismissed the coming together of rival NCP factions in Pune and Pimpri Chinchwad as a localised development.
Shifting alliances
Fadnavis led the ruling alliance’s campaign, travelling across the state to canvass for Mahayuti candidates, which include the BJP and the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena. These are the first BMC polls since the 2022 split in the Shiv Sena, when Shinde broke away with a majority of the party’s MLAs. The undivided Shiv Sena had controlled India’s richest civic body for 25 years, from 1997 to 2022.
All eyes on BMC
The race for Mumbai’s mayoral post took centre stage during the campaign. The BJP claimed that a Shiv Sena UBT victory could result in a Muslim mayor, a charge countered by Uddhav Thackeray’s party, which assured voters of a Marathi mayor. Fadnavis also guaranteed that the next mayor would be Hindu and Marathi.
In Mumbai, the BJP is contesting 137 seats, the Shiv Sena 90 and the NCP separately on 94 seats. The Shiv Sena UBT has fielded 163 candidates, the MNS 52, the Congress 143 and the VBA 46. The Congress has fielded 1,263 candidates across the rest of the state.
Security arrangements and voter mobilisation
More than 25,000 police personnel have been deployed across Mumbai to oversee polling and vote counting for the BMC elections.
In a significant political development ahead of the polls, estranged cousins Uddhav and Raj Thackeray reunited after two decades in a bid to consolidate Marathi votes. At the same time, rival NCP factions forged a local alliance in Pune and Pimpri Chinchwad.
The Congress has asserted its presence in Mumbai by stepping out of the shadow of its Maha Vikas Aghadi allies, Shiv Sena UBT and NCP SP. The party has joined hands with Prakash Ambedkar’s Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi and the Rashtriya Samaj Paksh in Mumbai, while contesting independently in Nagpur.
Cities going to polls
Of the 29 municipal corporations going to elections, 9 are located in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region. The cities and towns voting include Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Navi Mumbai, Vasai Virar, Kalyan Dombivli, Kolhapur, Nagpur, Mumbai, Solapur, Amravati, Akola, Nashik, Pimpri Chinchwad, Pune, Ulhasnagar, Thane, Chandrapur, Parbhani, Mira Bhayandar, Nanded Waghala, Panvel, Bhiwandi Nizampur, Latur, Malegaon, Sangli Miraj Kupwad, Jalgaon, Ahilyanagar, Dhule, Jalna and Ichalkaranji.
Star campaigners and key promises
Fadnavis, along with his deputies Eknath Shinde and Ajit Pawar, campaigned across Maharashtra, while Uddhav and Raj Thackeray focused their efforts on Mumbai, Thane, Nashik and Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar. Telangana minister Mohammad Azharuddin, AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi and Tamil Nadu BJP leader K Annamalai were among the prominent campaigners.
Populist promises for women featured prominently in the manifestos of both the Mahayuti and the Shiv Sena UBT MNS alliance. The Mahayuti promised a 50 per cent concession for women on BEST bus travel, while the Thackeray cousins assured a Rs 1,500 monthly allowance for women domestic helps and a property tax waiver on houses up to 700 sq ft. The Congress manifesto focused on tackling Mumbai’s pollution, upgrading the BEST fleet and strengthening the city’s financial health.
Key candidates and contests
Mumbai will witness several high profile contests. These include Samadhan Sarvankar, son of former MLA Sada Sarvankar, contesting from Ward 194 in Worli, the constituency of Shiv Sena UBT MLA Aaditya Thackeray. Sada Sarvankar’s daughter Priya Gurav Sarvankar is contesting from Ward 191 in Mahim.
Saurabh Ghosalkar of Shiv Sena UBT, son of former MLA Vinod Ghosalkar, is contesting from Ward 7 in Dahisar. Nishikant Shinde, brother of Shiv Sena UBT MLC Sunil Shinde, is locked in a prestige battle in central Mumbai. Relatives of Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar, Makrand, Harshita and Gauravi Shivalkar, are also contesting from different wards in Colaba.
Shiv Sena UBT MLA Sunil Prabhu’s son and BJP leader Kirti Somaiya’s son Neil are also in the fray. Former mayors Kishori Pednekar, Shraddha Jadhav, Milind Vaidya and Vishakha Raut have re entered the poll arena. Leaders who lost recent Assembly or Lok Sabha elections, including Yamini Jadhav from Ward 209 in Byculla and Praveena Morajkar from Ward 169 in Kurla, are also contesting the civic polls.
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