Elections have begun in 10 municipal corporations in Maharashtra, including in Mumbai on Thursday morning, where a triangular contest is on the cards between the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party combine, Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party-Republican Party of India alliance and the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena.
Elections are being held in Thane, Ulhasnagar, Pune, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Solapur, Nashik, Akola, Amravati and Nagpur municipal corporations. The 10 civic bodies have an electorate of 2.02 crore and will elect 1,244 candidates.
Senior leaders like NCP chief Sharad Pawar, Sena chief Bal Thackeray and Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan addressed a flurry of poll meetings to campaign for their respective parties for the February 16 elections, seen as the mini assembly polls.
In the 227-seat Mumbai corporation, the election is a fiercely fought affair. It is a challenge for the Congress-NCP combine which aims to dethrone the Sena-BJP combine, at the helm of civic affairs for the last 16 years.
The polls will also prove the credentials of the MNS, which threatens to endanger the Sena stronghold. Political analysts are describing the elections as a battle of survival for the Shiv Sena as the politically significant Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation has been in its power since 1996.
NCP chief Sharad Pawar, an old friend of Thackeray, was quoted in a section of the media as saying that the saffron party is on the decline and 86-year old Thackeray’s son Uddhav, now Sena executive president, is a ‘failure’.
The campaign was a no-holds-barred one where personality clashes came to the fore. There was war of words between Raj and Uddhav and also between senior ministers Narayan Rane and Ajit Pawar. Raj was also involved in a verbal duel with senior minister Chhagan Bhujbal.
The Congress was caught in an embarrassing situation over the recent seizure of Rs one crore cash by the police in Amravati. President Pratibha Patil’s son and Congress Member of Legislative Assembly Raosaheb Shekhawat said he had sought funds from the state Congress committee for distribution among 87 party candidates.
BJP, which is in the Opposition in the Congress-NCP ruled municipal corporation, alleged that the Congress put the money into circulation to influence voters before polls.
In Mumbai, the police are all geared up to ensure that voting across the city is smooth. A total of 2,375 police officers and 20,000 policemen are being deployed at polling booths across the city.
Almost 2,000 home guards and five companies of State Reserve Police Force have also been roped in and Rapid Action Force men will be deployed at strategic locations.
——PTI