Maval Lok Sabha seat: It’s Shiv Sena vs BJP vs NCP in next three days

Thackeray to address rally in Karjat, Fadnavis in Nigdi and Pawar in Rahatni. NCP chief Sharad Pawar will also address a workers’ conference at Rahatni on Saturday.

NCP chief Sharad Pawar, CM Devendra Fadnavis and Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray. (File)

The battle for Maval Lok Sabha constituency seems set to take off in the next three days, when senior leaders from BJP, Shiv Sena and NCP will hold rallies in the constituency to launch what is widely believed as a “poll campaign” for the party’s probable candidates.

The Maval seat was carved out in 2009 from Pune and Raigad districts. Of the six assembly seats under it, three are in Pune district and three in Raigad district. In 2014, Shiv Sena’s Shrirang Barne had defeated then independent candidate Laxman Jagtap by a margin of over 1.50 lakh votes.

On Thursday, Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray will hold a public meeting in Karjat while Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis will hold a public rally in Nigdi on Saturday. NCP chief Sharad Pawar will also address a workers’ conference at Rahatni on Saturday.

“The Chief Minister is launching the party’s poll campaign in the state. The Nigdi rally will be the first such rally for BJP in the state,” said Jagtap, now a BJP MLA and the party’s Pimpri-Chinchwd unit president.

Jagtap’s supporters said the party has given him the go-ahead to contest the Lok Sabha elections. They said while the official announcement will be made by the party high command closer to the election, unofficially he has been told to start campaigning.

While Jagtap resfued to comment on the chances of his candidature, he said he has been working in the constituency for the past five years and has been constantly in touch with local residents. Earlier this month, Jagtap had dismissed rumours about contesting from another party if he was denied a ticket. “If I have to contest the Lok Sabha elections, I will contest only from BJP,” he had said. He had also said that if the party asked him to contest from Baramati, he was ready to do so.

BJP general secretary Sarang Kamtekar, however, said, “The rally is not for any candidate, but the party is preparing itself for the Lok Sabha election. In case there is no alliance with the Shiv Sena, the party feels that it should be in a position to take on the challenge. “

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Barne, meanwhile, said Uddhav Thackeray’s public rally in Karjat will be part of the Sena’s poll campaign. “We are expecting a huge response for our president’s rally,” he said. Barne’s supporters said a similar rally was conducted by the Sena chief in Shirur constituency last week for party candidate and three-time MP Shivajirao Adhalrao-Patil.

Barne said he was confident that he will be fielded again and was not worried about who his opponents will be. “My work speaks for itself. I have been adjuged the best parliamentarian, which only reflects the kind of work I have done and the issues I have raised in Parliament. The entire country knows about my achievements and so do the people of my constituency,” he said.

Another major rally will be held in Rahatni on Saturday afternoon, when NCP chief Sharad Pawar will address workers. Rpresentatives of workers’ unions and leaders from different political parties have also been invited for the event.

While the NCP said the rally was not a political one, a party leader said since the party was taking up the issues faced by contract workers, it would indirectly benefit the NCP in the run-up to the elections.

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NCP’s Pimpri-Chinchwad unit president Sanjoy Waghere, who has taken the lead in organising the workers’ conference, however, said, “There is no politics involved in organising the conference. It is a social issue and affects every resident in Pimpri-Chinchwad and Pune.”

In the same breath, Waghere, president of the Bhiku Waghere-Patil Prathisthan, said he was one of the aspirants for the Maval Lok Sabha seat. “We will soon hold public rallies for the Lok Sabha election,” he said.

NCP is also considering fielding Parth Pawar, son of senior leader Ajit Pawar, from the Maval seat. NCP believes that if Parth is fielded from Maval, the move will also have a positive impact on the prospects of the party candidate in neighbouring Shirur constituency.

Political analyst Mahadev Sahasrabuddhe said after the 2014 parliamentary elections, when Sena candidate Shrirang Barne won with a massive margin, the political landscape changed. “Six months after the Lok Sabha election, the BJP won three of the six assembly seats under Maval parliamentary constituency. Besides, it secured landslide victories in the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation and Panvel Municipal Corporation. The party has covered a lot of ground and is now in a position to take on the Sena,” Sahasrabuddhe said.

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He said if the BJP and Sena failed to forge an alliance, Maval would witness an electoral fight between the two parties. “In case they do form an alliance, the Sena, which has traditionally held the seat, should have no problems,” he said.

Manoj Dattatrye More

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades. Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died. Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More

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