Tough fight awaits Congress, Sena-BJP in Marathwada

AURANGABAD, January 25: The tussle for the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls in Marathwada region of Maharashtra appears to be between the Congres...

AURANGABAD, January 25: The tussle for the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls in Marathwada region of Maharashtra appears to be between the Congress and the Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance with the announcement of candidates for the two key constituencies of Nanded and Latur.

Nanded is the home district of former Union minister S B Chavan and Latur has been earlier represented by former Lok Sabha speaker Shivraj Patil-Chakurkar.

In Nanded the Congress has announced the name of former MP Gangadhar Kunturkar who is pitted against Dr Dhanajirao Deshmukh of the BJP-Sena alliance. Others in the fray are Dr Vyankatesh Kabde of the Janata Dal and Shankar Ghondge of the Swantantra Bharat Paksha (SBP).

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Nanded constituency comprises six assembly segments – Nanded, Mudkhed, Biloli, Mukhed, Kandhar and Ahmedpur. Out of these, three have been captured by Congress, two by Shiv Sena and one by BJP. The constituency has always been the Congress citadel as the party has won the elections all the time except in 1977 an 1989. In the last Lok Sabha polls, Kunturkar had defeated Dhanjirao Deshmukh by a margin of 11,000 votes.

However, political observers feel that things might not be easy this time around as Kunturkar, who was very close to Chavan during the last elections, is said to have distanced himself from Chavan and is stated to be in good books of former chief minister Pawar. This can have considerable impact on the outcome of the elections, political observers felt.