OCTOBER 7: Former minister and Shiv Sena rebel Ganesh Naik's debacle in his bastion Belapur assembly constituency has led to the inevitable - charges that his former party used its dirty tricks department to see him defeated. Sitaram Bhoir, once Naik's colleague, won the seat by a somewhat slender margin of 2,786 votes. Naik fough as an Independent supported by Sharad Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party.Naik and his supporters in his newly-formed Shiv Shakti believe that the Sena indulged in foulplay, mainly with the mess-up in electoral rolls so that several thousand voters' names did not figure in the lists. "We were unaware of the subtle ways in which the Sena used the state administration to turn this election against me," Naik said.His defeat did not stop a steady stream of supporters from visiting his office at Bonkode village here. They reiterated their support to him but made it a point to say that the Sena had "played dirty" to win the election. Adding credibility to the charges are statementsfrom within the Sena rank-and-file that worked behind-the-scenes for Naik to honour old ties.However, Bhoir who secured 81,764 votes said, "Naik had to pay for becoming over-confident. Since we were taking him on in his own bastion we worked really hard and the result is the fruit of our efforts." He admitted that it was a ``matter of prestige'' for the Sena to win the seat but denied allegations of malpractices. "It's just a case of sour grapes," he said laughing.Shiv Sainiks who still favour Naik say of Bhoir, "winning the election is not everything. Let's see what he does." A senior Sainik from Navi Mumbai who pointed out, "apart from being known as Anand Dighe's protege and an ex-deputy mayor of the TMC he has little else to show for himself."Naik's advocate Ashok Pohekar who has petitioned the EC about foulplay said, "As many as 87,000 voters were deleted from the voters list in the constituency. This led to many people returning without voting. They were our voters and their being unable tovote meant a loss for us."When asked why Naik or any Shiv Shakti official had not made a noise about this on the polling day he said, "We did. We have been pursuing the matter with local election authorities since then but they have not responded for obvious reasons." He was of the opinion that the officials were functioning in an atmosphere of fear. "This has led to jugglery in the counting too," he alleged pointing out how Naik should have won by a margin 25,000 votes atleast. The Shivshakti leader secured only 78,978 votes this time compared to the 1,14,947 he had secured in 1995.Citizens have also expressed surprise at Naik's defeat. Srilatha Raghavan, a resident of Sector-16 in Vashi, was among the women supporters who flocked to Naik's office to express her displeasure. She said, "Forget state politics or which party he comes from. What is important is that Naik has always placed local issues on a priority above everything else which is why we vote for him." Naik was brave. "The defeat will notaffect my morale. It works otherwise," he said recalling how he had lost the 1985 election by 22,000 votes only to romp home victorious in 1990 and 1995.Meanwhile, Prakash Paranjape (Sena) has retained the Thane Lok Sabha seat, winning over Nakul Patil (Cong) by a margin of 98,997 votes. The Dahanu seat has also been retained by Chintaman Wanga (BJP), who won over Damodar Shingda of the Congress by a margin of 6,2270 votes.
