MNS may hurt Sena candidates’ prospects in Mumbai civic body polls

MUMBAI, February16, 2012: The fate of 2,232 candidates, battling it out for 227 seats of the Bombay Municipal Corporation (BMC), will be decided by more than 10 million voters in elections to be held here on Thursday.However, going by the past track-record of Mumbai’s traditionally lethargic voters, less than half of the electorate is expected to exercise its franchise. Another 10 million voters in nine other cities in Maharashtra — including Thane, Ulhasnagar, Pune, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Solapur, Nashik, Akola, Amravati and Nagpur — will be entitled to vote in elections to the respective civic bodies on Thursday. In Mumbai, it is a three-way fight between the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) combine, the Shiv Sena-BJP-Republican Party of India grouping and the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena. The elections are crucial for the two feuding Thackeray cousins — Uddhav, son of Bal Thackeray, founder of the Shiv Sena, and Raj, who split with the Sena and founded the MNS. The ageing Thackeray, who ventured out to address a few election rallies in recent days, targetted his nephew, who could end up splitting the Sena vote base, significantly benefitting the Congress-NCP combine. The elections also assume significance for Prithviraj Chavan, Maharashtra’s chief minister, who has been away from state politics for much of his career, spending time in Delhi. This is the first time that he is steering the Congress in elections in Maharashtra. And though the Congress and the NCP are allies, there is bitterness between the two parties, especially with leaders like Ajit, nephew of NCP supremo and union agriculture minister, Sharad Pawar, trying to assert their hold over state politics. The BMC, with an annual budget of Rs220 billion (about Dh16.2 billion), is the richest civic body in India, and also one of the most corrupt. Elected officials are known to siphon off millions of rupees, awarding deals to favourite contractors and ensuring that despite shoddy execution, their bills are cleared. The Shiv Sena-BJP combine has been controlling the BMC since 1996, but the Congress-NCP is seeking to oust the saffron partners. Helping them is Raj Thackeray’s MNS, which is expected to hurt the prospects of several Sena candidates in the metropolis.