With the civic election of Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) is round the corner, former corporators have started defecting to other parties. Within a week, four former corporators who had earlier defected to Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) have now left the party.
While three of them joined the Shiv Sena last week, the one joined Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) on Tuesday.
Divya Vaibhaw Gaikwad, a former corporator from Vashi joined along with her husband Vaibhaw Gaikwad decided to remain with the NCP. They met with NCP President Shard Pawar on Tuesday and showed their solidarity with the party. Vaibhaw Gaikwad said, “I had first contested NMMC election under the symbol of NCP in 2010 and won it. In 2015, my wife Divya contested from the same seat under the same symbol and she had also won the election,” said Gaikwad. He added that they continue to stand with the NCP and decided to contest the upcoming civic election under the same symbol.
In September 2019, a total of 55 corporators from NCP had supported Ganesh Naik who had defected to the BJP along with his son Sandip Naik. While most of the NCP corporators did not resign from the party, they reportedly supported Naik in all civic committees’ decision at NMMC.
Gaikwad said that as an educated corporator, he needed a place where he can raise common people issue. “I felt I could not do justice with my voters if I switched to other party. So, I decided to remain with the NCP,” said Gaikwad. He added that despite there is no clarity on civic election time, I have taken a decision to fight the election under the NCP symbol.
Last week, former standing committee chairman, Navin Gavte, his wife Aparna Gavte and their close relative Deepa Gavte joined Shiv Sena. Gavte was also associated with the NCP and he had become standing committee chairman after Naik defected to BJP. Gavte had stood by him.
Ramchandra Gharat, BJP Navi Mumbai President said, “Before the election, such kinds of defections happen and this will not affect to the party.” He added that it was Vaibhaw Gaikwad who used to suggest to join party and within a year, his stand changes.
