United MVA mauls BJP, wins 4 of 6 seats in MLC polls

An NCP worker greets party leader Supriya Sule during the celebration in Mumbai

What could be the nemesis of their arch-rival Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the longer run, the Maha Vikas Aghadi stood united in the legislative council polls winning four out of six seats. Though Shiv Sena lost a sitting MLC to an independent in Amravati, the Congress and Nationalist Party (NCP) completed the BJP's rout in its strongholds of Nagpur, Aurangabad and Pune divisions.

Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) workers celebrate in Mumbai after the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) won four of six seats in the legislative council polls on Friday. Pics/PTI

The biennial elections were conducted on Tuesday in the graduates constituencies (Nagpur, Pune and Aurangabad revenue divisions) and teachers' (Pune and Amravati revenue divisions), and a by-election in the self-government segment of Dhule-Nandurbar districts. On Friday, the results brought the MVA a sense of great achievement and confidence even as its performance in the first year is being assessed. The MVA's unity has been put under the scrutiny time and again and speculations made about Uddhav Thackeray government's stability and longevity.

Upsets in Nagpur and Pune
A stunner was delivered in Nagpur graduates constituency where the BJP held fort for the last 58 years. Congress candidate Abhijit Wanjari beat BJP's Sandeep Joshi by a formidable lead. The Nagpur seat was held by Anil Sole who was dropped for Joshi.

Before Sole held it, union minister Nitin Gadkari and ex-CM Devendra Fadnavis' father, Gangadharrao Fadnavis, represented the BJP here. Before Fadnavis and Gadkari's elections, the graduates in Nagpur revenue division always sent senior Sangh Parivar members to the upper house. Wanjari changed it on Friday. The defeat is a setback to the BJP's top leadership.

BJP's other big leader, state head Chandrakant Patil's fiefdom collapsed when NCP's Arun Lad won handsomely in the Pune graduates segment. A dominant BJP had sent Patil to the house multiple terms from here before he won the Assembly polls from Pune city last year. In Pune division teachers' constituency, Congress's Jayant Aasgavkar was leading comfortably against BJP-supported independent Jitendra Pawar.

NCP's Satish Chavan retained the Aurangabad graduates seat beating BJP's Shirish Boralkar. BJP's only gain came in Dhule-Nandurbar where local strongman Amrish Patel won a by-election. The vacancy was created when Patel resigned from the Congress and quit the seat before joining the BJP.

Sena defeated
Sena faced an upset in Amravati division teachers' constituency. Its official candidate Shrikant Deshpande, who had won with significant margin earlier as the BJP and Sena candidate, lost to an independent, Kiran Sarnaik. Local Sena leaders accused the NCP of helping Sarnaik instead of Deshpande. They said Sarnaik is related to a senior NCP minister from Vidarbha. The BJP finished fourth because it could not contain rebellion of the like-minded candidates. State BJP president Chandrakant Patil said the NCP backstabbed Shiv Sena by supporting the independent.

'Gain was historic'
MVA's architect and NCP president Sharad Pawar said the gain in Nagpur and Pune was historic and it showed anti-BJP sentiments and was a reflection of MVA's good performance. "The picture has changed in the state," he said.

Fadnavis accepted the results, saying they were not as per our expectations. "We were expecting more seats but won only one. We miscalculated the combined power of the three parties. We will introspect and we would also want the CM's party to introspect because it hasn't won a single seat."

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