With the BJP backing out of the contest, the Shiv Sena was on Monday poised to retain power in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), the country’s richest civic body, after its victory in the mayoral and deputy mayoral elections became a foregone conclusion.
While Shiv Sena’s Kishori Pednekar was set to get elected unopposed as the Mumbai Mayor at the elections scheduled for November 22, while the election of Sena’s Suhas Wadkar as the Mumbai’s deputy Mayor became a mere formality.
Pednekar and Wadkar were the only candidates who had filed nominations for the November 22 Mayoral and deputy Mayoral elections respectively, when the deadline for nominations ended on Monday.
The BJP, which has a strength of 83 corporators as against the Shiv Sena’s strength of 94 corporators in the 227-member BMC, pulled out of the prestigious mayoral race, saying that it did not have the sufficient numbers to bag the prestigious post. Similarly, the BJP did not put up any candidate for the deputy mayoral poll.
Interestingly, the changed political equations in the state have had a fallout on the BMC Mayoral elections. In the previous polls to the posts of Mayor and deputy Mayor held in 2017, the BJP had thrown its weight behind the Shiv Sena, the Raj Thackeray-led MNS ( with then seven members) had boycotted the polls and 16 corporators — including 15 of those belonging to NCP and Samjawadi Party had chosen to remain neutral in the polls.
However, this time around, the BJP — with having snapped its ties with its oldest ally at the state level — is not supporting the Shiv Sena in the BMC’s Mayoral and deputy mayoral polls.
The Congress — which had put up candidates against the Shiv Sena nominees in the mayoral and deputy mayoral polls in 2017 — has chosen not to field candidates for the twin polls, thus making matters easy for the Shiv Sena.
The Congress, which has a strength of 29 corporators in the BMC, will be indirectly supporting the Shiv Sena in the twin polls of November 22. The Congress’ decision to extend covert support to the Shiv Sena stems from its growing proximity with the Congress at the state-level.
Ahead of the expiry of the deadline for the filing of nominations to the November 22 polls, BJP’s former Mumbai unit president and minister Ashish Shelar said:
“We don’t have the required numbers in the BMC. We do not to enter into an illegitimate alliance with opposing ideologies. But, in 2022, we shall win the Mumbai Mayor post on our strength and numbers”.
It may be recalled that the BMC polls held in 2017 had thrown up a hung house. The Shiv Sena had emerged as the single largest party with 84 seats in the 227-member BMC, followed by BJP- 82, Congress- 31, NCP- 9, MNS- 7 and others-- 14.
During the last two and a half years in power, the Shiv Sena increased its strength to 94, by inducting among others seven corporators from the Raj Thackeray-led NCP.
Kishori Pednekar (56), who is set to replace Vishwanath Pandurang Mahadeshwar (also of the Shiv Sena) as the next Mayor of Mumbai, is the senior-most corporator in the BMC. She will hold the post for the next two and half years.
Given that the Mayor’s post was put in the open category in the run up to the polls, there were several contenders for the post within the Shiv Sena. Among those who were lobbying with the Shiv Sena leadership for the nomination candidate for the Mayoral polls were Ashish Chemburkar, Yeshwant Jadhav, Mangesh Satamkar, Vishaka Raut and Shekar Waigankar.
Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray made an announcement about Pednekar’s nomination as the Sena Mayoral candidate. She and deputy mayoral nominee Suhas Wadkar filed their papers later in the later.