Panchayat Samiti polls too saw BJP in the lead as they conquered Congress and NCP bastions
The Bharatiya Janata Party has strengthened its hold over Maharashtra with the party registering victories in eight of the 10 municipal corporations which had gone to polls on Tuesday. While the party was a close runner-up in Mumbai, where ally Shiv Sena had snapped ties to contest solo, it emerged winner in major cities like Pune, Nashik, Nagpur, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Solapur, Akola, Ulhasnagar and Amravati.
The only solace for the Shiv Sena came from Thane, where it stole a convincing march over others. In Pune, the BJP, which was rife with internal factionalism, snatched victory from the jaws of defeat to emerge trumps over the NCP. In neighbouring Pimpri- Chinchwad — which has been an NCP stronghold for long (it was earlier part of NCP chief Sharad Pawar's Baramati Lok Sabha constituency) — the BJP managed to win.
The BJP roped in NCP men like MLAs Laxman Jagtap into its fold in Pimpri-Chinchwad and inducted independent legislator Mahesh Landge. Solapur, which is the stronghold of former chief minister and Union ex-home minister Sushilkumar Shinde and has a strong presence of Muslims, Kannada and Telugu speakers, the BJP's MP Sharad Bansode and state ministers Subhashbapu Deshmukh and Vijaykumar Deshmukh outmaneuvered both —Shinde's Congress and the Sena.
In Nashik, the BJP edged out the Shiv Sena which was confident of emerging victorious over Raj Thackeray's MNS. Fadnavis said the "unprecedented victories" reflected the peoples' support to the BJP's agenda for transparency in governance.
He added that the BJP had made substantial gains in around 14 zilla parishads, results for which were also announced on Thursday, and had snatched the Latur zilla parishad from the Congress. The party also made inroads in districts like Satara and Sangli which is the traditional bastion of the Congress and NCP, Fadnavis noted.
"The victory has been given to us by the people. Our responsibility has increased. We will work hard for the people," said finance and forests minister Sudhir Mungantiwar. A senior BJP leader noted that the factor which had worked most for them was the lack of a strong, credible opposition, with the people yet to overcome their sense of anger against 15 years of rule by the Congress and NCP.
Of the 1,509 zilla parishad seats, the BJP led the pack with 397, followed by the NCP at 336, Congress (293) and Shiv Sena (259). The MNS and others won one and 147 seats with results for 76 seats pending by 9 pm.
However, the results came as a jolt for rural development minister Pankaja Munde who faced reserves in Beed, where NCP's leader of opposition in the state legislative council Dhananjay Munde emerged trumps.
Swabhimaani Shetkari Sanghatana minister Sadabhau Khot's son Sagar also lost the zilla parishad from Sangli.
In the Panchayat Samitis, the BJP captured 803 of 2,990 seats, followed by the NCP at 630. The Congress (555), Shiv Sena (538), others (281) and MNS (2) make up for the rest of the tally with counting underway at 181 seats.
A Sena source admitted that the party was overtly fixated with Mumbai and Thane and had chosen to focus on the belt at the cost of expansion in other areas.
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