In Maharashtra, Cong winded by blows from BJP, MVA ahead of Legislative Council polls

In a setback for the Congress, its incumbent candidate from the Nashik graduate seat, Sudhir Tambe, has backtracked at the last moment, declining to contest the election. Instead, his son Satyajeet Tambe has filed the nomination from the seat as an Independent. The BJP’s decision not to field any candidate in the Nashik fray is clearly aimed to facilitate the smooth sailing of Satyajeet from there.

The BJP’s operation to wrest the seat from the Congress in Nashik was apparently led by Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, which left the grand old party stumped.

Fadnavis however said, “Look, we have no role in this matter. It’s the Congress’s internal matter. But wait and watch.”

The Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee’s president Nana Patole has vowed that he will upset the BJP’s gamplan by ensuring the denial of support of the Opposition alliance, Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), to Tambe’s son. The Congress has decided to throw its weight behind an ex-BJP leader Shubhangi Patil. who is contesting from the Nashik graduate constituency as an Independent too. She is likely to get the backing of the MVA.

However, it is not only the BJP that the Congress is grappling with in the Council polls. Even its MVA allies, the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) and the Sharad Pawar-led NCP, have dealt the party a blow by fielding an Uddhav Sena candidate Gangadhar Nakade from the Nagpur teacher seat without consulting it. An upset Congress has claimed that this has been its traditional seat.

Amid the twists and turns marking the Council polls, the Amravati graduate seat is poised for a straight contest between the BJP’s Ranjit Patil and the Congress’s Dheeraj Lingade. In Aurangabad division’s teacher constituency, the incumbent NCP candidate Vikram Kale will take on the BJP’s nominee Kiran Patil, a former Congress leader.

In the Konkan division’s teacher constituency, the BJP has fielded Dnyaneshwar Mhatre against the sitting MLC Balaram Patil of the Peasant and Workers Party. The Congress, NCP and Shiv Sena (UBT) have supported Patil’s candidature.

These elections are necessitated following the completion of tenure of the sitting candidates including Sudhir Tambe ( Nashik), Ranjit Patil (Amravati), Vikram Kale (Aurangabad), Nagor Ganar (Nagpur), and Balaram Patil (Konkan).

The Opposition camp has accused the BJP of bringing its “political ruthlessness and manoeuvrings” into the Legislative Council polls even for the graduate and teacher constituencies, which, the MVA maintained, did not exist earlier. The state NCP’s chief Jayant Patil lamented, “In the past elections were contested seriously. But the concept of getting a seat by hook or crook, which has become the BJP’s way, was not there.”

The BJP however justified its aggressive strategy and approach, what the MVA called “tod-phod politics (politics of breaking rival outfits). State BJP chief Chandrashekhar Bawankule said, “We take every elections seriously keeping victory in mind. But we are not doing anything unethical. If Congress cannot keep its own house in order, it should blame itself, not the BJP.”

In June 2022, the BJP had bagged five of the ten Council seats that went to the polls. Even then it was Congress which had suffered a jolt as its Dalit candidate Chandrakant Handore lost his seat.

In the 78-member Council, the BJP is currently the single largest party with 24 seats.