Maharashtra civic polls: BJP-led Mahayuti on course for big win
Results started coming in for elections to 246 municipal councils and 42 nagar panchayats across the state. Trends for 288 municipal president posts showed the Mahayuti leading on 210 seats, while the MVA was ahead on 50 seats. Political parties also began releasing lists of their winning candidates as counting progressed.
New Delhi: The ruling Mahayuti took a massive lead in the Maharashtra municipal council and nagar panchayat elections on Sunday, as counting of votes for the December 2 elections began at 10 am. The Congress, meanwhile, recorded a comparatively better performance within the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi.
Results started coming in for elections to 246 municipal councils and 42 nagar panchayats across the state. Trends for 288 municipal president posts showed the Mahayuti leading on 210 seats, while the MVA was ahead on 50 seats. Political parties also began releasing lists of their winning candidates as counting progressed.
According to early trends, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won 128 municipal president posts, followed by the Shiv Sena (Shinde faction) with 51 and the Nationalist Congress Party (Ajit Pawar faction) with 34. The Congress also secured 34 posts. The Nationalist Congress Party (Sharad Pawar faction) won eight seats, while the Shiv Sena (UBT) secured nine. Local alliances won 22 posts.
Shifting political equations in Maharashtra
Polling for 23 municipal councils and nagar panchayats had been postponed earlier and was held on December 20. Counting for those seats will take place separately.
The elections saw shifting political equations on the ground, with several local-level alliances cutting across traditional party lines. During the campaign, the BJP led by chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and the Shiv Sena led by deputy chief minister Eknath Shinde often campaigned against each other in several areas.
In Kolhapur, rival factions of the NCP led by Ajit Pawar and party founder Sharad Pawar were seen sharing the stage.
Congress, BJP understanding in many pockets
In several pockets, local Congress units also entered into understandings with the BJP, indicating that local issues and candidate dynamics outweighed established political rivalries in these elections.
A turnout of 67.3 per cent was recorded in the polls of 263 local bodies held on December 2, while 47.04 per cent of voters exercised their franchise in the second phase of the elections in 23 local bodies on Saturday, the State Election Commission said.
Members and presidents of Dondaicha Municipal Council in Dhule and Angar Nagar Panchayat in Solapur were elected unopposed, and the polls for the post of Jammer municipal president also remained a no-contest affair.