Mumbai: Old allies Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Shiv Sena will be locking horns in the upcoming elections for the post of president in the ward committees of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).
On Monday, BJP filed nominations for its candidate in fifteen committees while Sena fielded its candidates in fourteen committees.
There are 17 ward committees in Mumbai comprising of the 24 BMC wards. Presently, nine committees have BJP presidents while Sena has eight presidents.
"There are four wards where BJP has the highest number of corporators, so we didn't nominate our candidates from these wards as it's clear BJP will win with an absolute majority in these wards," Visakha Raut, senior corporator and Shiv Sena Leader of Party (LoP) in BMC told FPJ.
Meanwhile, Congress, which is the opposition party in the BMC, didn't file a single nomination for its candidates. Leaders of the party said that they didn't have the numbers to contest the elections.
Last week, during the election of executive committees, Congress had withdrawn its candidates which led to Sena's victory.
When asked if Congress stunt is meant to support the Sena indirectly, Raut stated, "We are not aware of Congress's agenda as these calls are taken by the high command of the parties."
"We have not filed our candidates because we don't have the numbers and we will also probably abstain from voting because we don't want to support the BJP," senior Congress corporator Asif Zakaria told FPJ.
Meanwhile, BJP, which presently has the highest number of ward committee presidents, stated that they will be winning maximum six seats this time.
"Congress is keen about maintaining its status quo as opposition while at the same time they are supporting Sena by remaining neutral. This is completely unjustified as they are making a fool out of the people of Mumbai," Vinod Mishra, senior BJP corporator and group leader of the party at BMC, told FPJ.
