Mumbai, July 30 (PTI) The NCP (SP) on Wednesday brainstormed over a strategy for the upcoming elections in Mumbai and other municipal corporations amid the evolving political landscape and potential realignments in the state.
NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) office-bearers from the Mumbai division discussed the election strategy, booth-level organisation, and public outreach campaigns.
State NCP (SP) president Shashikant Shinde, who led the discussions at the meeting, said the upcoming civic polls will be a contest between the “power of people and the power of money”.
“We neither have power nor money, but we have the strength of the people. Party workers should begin preparations from now,” Shinde told the party office-bearers and workers at the extended divisional executive meeting.
An NCP (SP) release stated that Shinde discussed concerns and suggestions given by the party’s office-bearers and workers.
Mumbai NCP (SP) president Rakhi Jadhav alleged that the BJP was misusing funds of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), currently under an administrator, for party promotion.
“Despite the absence of elected corporators for nearly three years, elections are deliberately delayed as part of the BJP’s agenda,” she alleged.
Jadhav claimed crores of rupees in BMC’s fixed deposits had been withdrawn and funds diverted to former corporators of the Mahayuti alliance parties.
“Our party continues to raise people’s issues and fight against this injustice under the leadership of Sharad Pawar. We are preparing to take on the ruling alliance in the upcoming BMC elections,” she added.
In the 2017 BMC polls, the BJP made giant strides in the Shiv Sena citadel of Mumbai by winning 82 seats in the 227-member civic body, just two seats behind the estranged saffron ally Shiv Sena (undivided).
The Congress was relegated to the third position with 31 seats, whereas the NCP (undivided) and Raj Thackeray’s MNS were reduced to 9 and 7 seats, respectively. AIMIM won three seats on debut in the BMC elections, Samajwadi Party six, Akhil Bhartiya Sena one and Independents four.
Over the last eight years, Maharashtra politics has taken many u-turns, with new alliances upending the traditional dominance of two alliances- NDA and the Opposition.
The Shiv Sena and NCP, headed by Uddhav Thackeray and Sharad Pawar before splits in the parties, have ceded the bulk of seats in the 2024 assembly elections to their rival factions.
The likely reunion between Uddhav and his estranged cousin Raj Thackeray, who shared the political stage for the first time in 20 years amid the Hindi “imposition” controversy, could unsettle ambitions of other parties to get the key to BMC’s coffers, believed to be the richest civic body in India.
A surprise visit paid by Raj Thackeray to Matoshree to wish Uddhav on his birthday also strengthened the perception of a tie-up between Sena (UBT) and MNS for the Mumbai civic polls on the plank of protecting “Marathi pride”. PTI MR NSK
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