MUMBAI: The voters of the Nagpur Zilla Parishad delivered a shocking blow to the BJP Wednesday, with the party managing just 15 of the 58 seats.
The Congress was the biggest beneficiary with 30 seats while ally the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) managed 12. The Shiv Sena, which contested independently, won the only other seat.
Elections to the local body were held Tuesday, three years after the Zilla Parishad was dissolved in 2017. When the local body was dissolved, the BJP had 22 seats, the Congress 19, Shiv Sena 8, and the NCP 7 seats.
The result is a massive setback for the BJP as Nagpur is considered one of its strongholds — former chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and Union Minister Nitin Gadkari belong to the city. Nagpur also houses the headquarters of the RSS, the ideological parent of the BJP.
This is also the first major election Nagpur has seen since the BJP lost power in the state. The party was routed in Dhapewada, Gadkari’s ancestral village.
‘Personality-driven campaign behind loss’
The Zilla Parishad elections are considered very important by political parties as it helps them spread their reach in rural and semi-urban areas. For political heavyweights in every party, the Zilla Parishad is the main route through which they control the villages and the local gram panchayats.
Senior BJP leaders blamed the personality-driven campaign undertaken by Fadnavis as the primary reason for the loss in these polls.
“The party changed its campaign leaders at the last moment. The local leaders are the face of the party in the rural and semi-urban areas,” a senior BJP leader from Maharashtra said. “They have a popular connect with the people. How can Devendra Fadnavis drop these leaders from the campaign platform?”
The leader, who was denied a ticket by Fadnavis in the 2019 assembly elections, felt that the one-man campaign failed to connect with voters.
“After we lost power in Maharashtra, Fadnavis has stopped consulting the local leaders. These leaders understand the pulse of rural Maharashtra,” said the leader.
Sources said it was only Fadnavis who consulted and implemented plans while Gadkari was kept out of strategising for these elections. With Gadkari unavailable to fire-fight party factionalism, it led to losses in crucial seats, said the source.
“Fadnavis was para-dropping for meetings, when he should have been in Nagpur coordinating the campaign with others,” the source added.
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Denial of ticket may have led to loss
The prime factor for the loss appears to be the denial of an MLA ticket to former minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule, said those in the know of events. Considered to be the moneybags candidate by all who know him, Bawankule was the unifying factor between the warring Gadkari and Fadnavis factions.
Caste also seemed to have played a dominant role. With Bawankule, who belongs to the Teli community, being cast aside by Fadnavis, the community moved away from the BJP. The Telis have been traditional voters of the BJP.
Speaking to ThePrint, the editor (Vidharbha) of ABP News, Sarita Kaushik, said, “This is a big blow to the BJP and shows that the change at the state level has permeated to the Zilla Parishad level.”
“All the ministers of the Congress and the NCP who are from this region worked very hard for the victory. The BJP has become too person-centric and it has not gone down well with the rural voters.”
According to Shailesh Pande, executive editor Sakal (Vidharbha edition), the BJP is losing ground in Nagpur.
“The people in the rural areas want change and their anger has forced a change. The rural mass appeal of the Congress is still there,” Pande said. “Now that the BJP is not in power it will be difficult to penetrate the rural base of the Congress.”
Like Kaushik, Pande too felt that a motivated Congress and NCP have worked hard in a unison to win the crucial seats.
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