Politics of opportunity mark presidential elections to Zilla Parishads

While some places saw Cong.-NCP joining hands, at others BJP, Shiv Sena came together

Pune: Presidential elections across the 25 Zilla Parishads (ZPs) in the State on Tuesday was marked by opportunistic alliances.

In the results to the elections to the 10 civic bodies and the 25 ZPs on February 23, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) juggernaut decisively trounced Sharad Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), while besting the Shiv Sena and rendering the other political players largely spectatorial.

While the Congress forged alliances with it’s erstwhile partner, the NCP, in some ZPs, to stop the BJP from staking a claim to the president’s post, in other places Shiv Sena set aside it’s animosity to forge a coalition with the BJP.

Western Maharashtra saw estranged allies, Congress and NCP joining hands in several places while at others the Shiv Sena and BJP forged coalitions. However, the Marathwada region witnessed twists with the Sena etching alliances with the Congress in some areas to stop the BJP staking claim to the president’s post.

Strange alliances

Crucial alliances with the Sena were forged in western Maharashtra’s sugar-belt district of Sangli where the BJP had defeated the NCP in its bastion to secure 25 of the 60 seats and emerge as the largest party.

The BJP’s Sangramsinh Deshmukh was elected president post while the Sena’s Suhas Babar was elected vice-president to the Sangli ZP.

Likewise, in the 67-seat Kolhapur ZP, the BJP-Sena alliance saw Shaumika Mahadik (BJP) being propped to the president’s post. However, the NCP’s Sarjerao Patil succeeded in becoming vice-president with the help of Congress.

After much delay, the 72-member Ahmednagar ZP finally saw a Congress-NCP alliance with senior Congress leader (and Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Assembly) Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil’s wife, Shalini, emerging as president of the local body with NCP backing. The NCP’s Rajshree Ghule was elected vice-president.

Cong-Sena in Marathwada

Meanwhile in Marathwada, despite the BJP emerging as the single-largest party in the 62-seat Aurangabad ZP, the Congress and the Sena joined hands to queer its pitch. The Sena with 18 seats, successfully elected its candidate Devyani Dongaonkar as president, while the Congress, which secured 16 seats elected Keshavrao Tayde-Patil as vice president.

As in Aurangabad, the BJP, which emerged as the single largest party securing 22 of the 56-seat Jalna ZP, was upstaged by the Congress joining hands with NCP (which won 13).

Anirudha Khotkar of the Sena (which won 14 seats) was elected president while Satish Tope of the NCP became vice-president.

The loss of Jalna is seen as a ‘loss of face’ for top BJP leaders like the State unit president Raosaheb Danve and Babanrao Lonikar, both of whom have their constituencies in this region.

However, the BJP managed to turn the tables on the NCP in the fiercely-disputed Beed ZP. The NCP had dented the BJP’s base here by winning 25 of the 60 seats.

This setback for top BJP leader and Minister Pankaja Munde on her home-turf caused her to theatrically proclaim her resignation. The chief architect of Ms. Munde defeat was her estranged cousin, NCP leader and Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the State Legislative Council Dhananjay Munde, which made her defeat personal.

However, seven supporters of rebel NCP leader Suresh Dhas backed the BJP today. Aided by the Shiv Sena and Vinayak Mete’s Shiv Sangram (a smaller BJP ally), the BJP reclaimed the Beed ZP with Savita Golhar becoming president while the Shiv Sangram’s Jayshree Mhaske was elected vice-president.

As consolation for the NCP and the Congress, the ZP results were a minor face-saver as compared to their rout in the civic bodies in Pune and Solapur – the erstwhile strongholds of the two parties.

While the NCP won a landslide in the Pune ZP, winning 44 of the 75 seats, both the NCP and the Congress made decent gains in the Marathwada division. The NCP won the Osmanabad ZP, snaring 26 of the 55 seats. The Congress also upset the BJP in Nanded, performing commendably to win 28 of the 63 seats in the Nanded ZP.

Another commendable win was in the Konkan region, where the Congress scored an absolute majority in the Sindhudurg ZillaParishad, winning 27 of the 50 seats.