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This is an archive article published on May 29, 2023

Uddhav Sena extends support to NCP for Pune Lok Sabha seat, but has eyes on Parth Pawar’s Maval hopes

On Sunday, Ajit Pawar had claimed that Congress has been losing the Pune Lok Sabha seat for a long time, and, therefore, the Nationalist Congress Party wants to contest from the constituency.

MVA seat sharing talks, Sharad pawar on MVA seat sharing formula, Lok Sabha 224 seat sharing formula, NCP, road to 2024, 2024 Lok Saha polls, Maha Vikas Aghadi, indian express, indian express newsAt a recent meeting of MVA leaders in Mumbai. File
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Uddhav Sena extends support to NCP for Pune Lok Sabha seat, but has eyes on Parth Pawar’s Maval hopes
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After NCP leader Ajit Pawar said his party wants to contest the Pune Lok Sabha bypoll, which traditionally has been fought by the Congress, the Shiv Sena (UBT) has extended support to its MVA ally. At the same time, the Shiv Sena (UBT) is preparing to contest the Maval Lok Sabha seat where Ajit Pawar’s son Parth Pawar is also gearing up for a fight for the second consecutive time.

On Sunday, Ajit Pawar had claimed that Congress has been losing the Pune Lok Sabha seat for a long time, and, therefore, the Nationalist Congress Party wants to contest from the constituency.

“In the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), we have decided that the party which has strength in a particular city will contest that city’s Lok Sabha seat. From the numbers in the civic body and Assembly elections, it is clear that the NCP is in a better position to contest the Pune Lok Sabha seat. Therefore, the Shiv Sena is in favour of the NCP contesting the Pune Lok Sabha seat,” Shiv Sena spokesperson Sanjay Raut told The Indian Express.

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However, Raut clarified that though the Sena (UBT) is in favour of the NCP contesting the Pune Lok Sabha, the final decision on the issue will be taken at an MVA meeting. “We will discuss the issue threadbare and then take a final decision. But as decided in our earlier meeting, a particular Lok Sabha seat will go to an alliance partner based on the strength of the partner in terms of corporators, MLAs, and votes received,” said Raut.

Meanwhile, even as the Congress and NCP are locked in a tussle for the Pune seat, which fell vacant following the death of the BJP’s Girish Bapat, there is likely to be another gridlock in the MVA over the Maval Lok Sabha seat.

When only the Congress and NCP were in an alliance before the MVA’s formation in 2019, the NCP had been contesting the Maval Lok Sabha seat. And, during the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance that existed before 2019, the Sena had been contesting the seat.

After the split in the Shiv Sena, the Uddhav Thackeray-led faction—now a part of the MVA—is also eyeing to contest the Maval Lok Sabha seat.

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Of the 22 Lok Sabha seats, the united Shiv Sena contested in 2019, it had won 18 of them—including Maval. Party candidate Shrirang Barne has won the Maval seat twice in 2014 and 2019—with over two lakh votes during both elections. Barne has now defected to the Sena led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde.

“Since the Maval Lok Sabha seat has come into existence, the Shiv Sena has been winning it convincingly. In 2019, our candidate had defeated Parth Pawar despite the NCP’s all-out efforts. We have a strong base in the Maval Lok Sabha seat. And therefore, we want to field our candidate from here,” said Raut.

The Shiv Sena (UBT), however, has a problem. After Barne defected, it only has one strong leader in Rahul Kalate. “We are considering various names, including that of Rahul Kalate,” said Raut.

However, Parth Pawar is unlikely to give up the seat. “Come what may, I will contest from the Maval Lok Sabha seat,” Parth Pawar had told The Indian Express last year.

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When contacted on Sunday, Parth Pawar said he will talk about the seat at later.

If Parth Pawar refuses to contest, the NCP has a strong candidate in Sunil Shelkhe, who is the party’s Maval MLA. NCP leaders said Shelkhe is the only candidate party has who is capable of defeating Barne.

“Shelkhe is very popular in the Maval area. His popularity spans both the Pune district and the Raigad district. He has good connect across the constituency,” said an NCP leader.

Shelke was involved in a controversy recently after he was named in an FIR related to a murder case although he has denied the allegations.

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The Uddhav Sena, however, is hopeful the NCP will backtrack from Maval. “We hope the NCP will allow us to contest the seat as we have been winning it,” said Raut.

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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