Mumbai: The Mumbaikars have shown a trend to elect candidates in six constituencies in Mumbai city and suburb of the same alliance – either of the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) aghadi or Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-Shiv Sena yuti. In 2009, Congress-NCP had won all six seats whereas in 2014 the BJP-Sena had won all the seats.
Both opposition and ruling parties are expecting that the same trend would repeat in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, too. This election for Mumbaikars is unique as for the first time country’s top industrialist Mukesh Ambani has endorsed the candidature of Milind Deora of Congress who is contesting from South Mumbai constituency.
It is yet not clear whether Ambani’s endorsement is limited to Deora or he has offered unqualified support to the Congress.
“Mumbai had remained with an alliance or aghadi in all six constituencies in the past. But, there is uncertainty whether the same trend will be repeated in the 2019 polls.
In 2004, when the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) had come into power, defeating the Atal Behari Vajpayee government at the Centre, Mumbai had contributed five seats of the total six seats. The exception was of Mumbai South-Central, which was won by the Shiv Sena’s Mohan Rawale.
However, in 2009 general polls, the Congress-NCP aghadi had won all the six seats. We are expecting the same result in the current election, too,” claimed Abhijit Sakpal, social media in-charge and political analyst of Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee. Ashish Shelar, BJP’s Mumbai city president, also claimed that all the six candidates will retain the seats.
However, political leaders across pary lines are concerned that high temperature and a five-day long weekend may impact the voter turnout as happened in Pune. “We fear that many Mumbaikars may take the opportunity to celebrate the five-day long holiday, starting from Saturday till Wednesday May 1.
An alert voter should come back on Monday to cast his vote and elect a candidate of his choice,” said a Congress leader. Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Mumbai and addressed a rally on Friday in support of the BJP-Sena alliance candidates.
Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray shared the dais with Modi and he also addressed the joint rally. However, Congress president Rahul Gandhi and NCP chief Sharad Pawar did not hold similar joint rallies in Mumbai to boost the morale of the party workers and the candidates.
In North Mumbai, the fight is between MP Gopal Shetty (BJP) and Urmila Matondkar (Congress). In Mumbai North-East, Manoj Kotak (BJP) is pitted against Sanjay Dina Patil (NCP). In the Mumbai North-West, sitting MP Gajanan Kirtikar (Shiv Sena) is fighting against Sanjay Nirupam (Congress) whereas in Mumbai North – Central, BJP MP Poonam Mahajan has Priya Dutt (Congress) as the chief opponent.
