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This is an archive article published on September 25, 2019

Tough task for NCP: Finding strong candidates against Laxman Jagtap, Mahesh Landge in Chinchwad, Bhosari

On Sunday, Ajit Pawar said the NCP was in a good position to win all three seats of Chinchwad, Bhosari and Pimpri.

Tough task for NCP: Finding strong candidates against Laxman Jagtap, Mahesh Landge in Chinchwad, Bhosari In Bhosari seat, Mahesh Landge had contested as an Independent candidate in the 2014 Assembly election and defeated sitting MLA Vilas Lande. Landge later joined the BJP.

Though senior NCP leader Ajit Pawar announced that the party will contest all three assembly seats in Pimpri-Chinchwad and refused to part with even one seat for alliance partner Congress, his party doesn’t seem to have a strong leader to take on sitting MLAs Laxman Jagtap and Mahesh Landge.

On Sunday, Ajit Pawar said the NCP was in a good position to win all three seats of Chinchwad, Bhosari and Pimpri.

In the 2014 Assembly elections, the NCP and Congress had lost all three seats after they contested separately.

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Urging Ajit Pawar to review his stand, Congress’ Pimpri-Chinchwad unit chief Sachin Sathe said, “I have spoken to party chief Balasaheb Thorat and our senior leader Prithviraj Chavan. I told them that this formula is not acceptable to us and there was a lot of anger among party workers.”

Sathe said the NCP should allot at least one seat to the Congress. “The NCP wants Congress’ support but doesn’t want our candidate. This is not fair. We urged Ajit Pawar to review his stand and allot one seat to the Congress,” he said.

In Bhosari seat, Mahesh Landge had contested as an Independent candidate in the 2014 Assembly election and defeated sitting MLA Vilas Lande. Landge later joined the BJP.

Tough task for NCP: Finding strong candidates against Laxman Jagtap, Mahesh Landge in Chinchwad, Bhosari BJP leader Laxman Jagtap had secured a decisive victory in the Chinchwad seat with over 1,23,000 votes while his rival, Sena candidate Rahul Kalate, managed only 63,000 votes. NCP candidate Nana Kate finished a distant third.

BJP leader Laxman Jagtap had secured a decisive victory in the Chinchwad seat with over 1,23,000 votes while his rival, Sena candidate Rahul Kalate, managed only 63,000 votes. NCP candidate Nana Kate finished a distant third.

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The Pimpri assembly seat was won by Shiv Sena’s Gautam Chabukswar, who defeated sitting MLA Anna Bansode.

Both Jagtap and Landge have, in the last five years, managed to remain in the limelight and push for development projects in Pimpri-Chinchwad. No leader from the NCP has managed to generate that kind of public interest through protests, dharnas or demands.

In Chinchwad, the NCP is considering leaders such as Bhausaheb Bhoir, Nana Kate and Sanjog Waghere. While each leader is popular in his respective ward, it is uncertain if they will be able to win the entire assembly segment.

In Bhosari seat, the NCP is likely to again field Vilas Lande, who has won the seat at least twice. Corporator Datta Sane, who was the opposition leader in Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation, is also an aspirant.

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Lande was expected to contest from the Shirur seat in the Lok Sabha elections earlier this year, and he had even started campaigning, but was replaced at the last minute by Amol Kolhe, who went on to win the seat.

Kartik Landge, brother of Mahesh Landge, said, “We don’t see much difficulty…but since it is a test, we will have to put in our best. We will certainly not take it lightly,” he said.

In the Pimpri reserved seat, NCP is likely to back Anna Bansode, who had won in the 2009 Assembly elections. The battle for Pimpri seat is likely to be an interesting one as Sujat Ambedkar, son of Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi leader Prakash Ambedkar, has also expressed interest in contesting from the seat. BJP corporator Bapu Ovhal, who is showing signs of rebellion, is also an aspirant. Ovhal recently invited Gujarat MLA and youth Dalit leader Jignesh Mevani for a talk on ‘threats to the Constitution’ in Pimpri-Chinchwad.

Another BJP corporator, Seema Savale, also wants to contest from the seat. “Irrespective of whether the alliance works out or not, I will contest,” she said.

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In the 2014 seat-sharing formula in the saffron alliance, the Pimpri seat was with the Shiv Sena.

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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