Amidst seat-sharing talks among Mahayuti, Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena demanded three of Pune's eight assembly seats in the upcoming state elections. Despite not having any MLAs in Pune city currently, Shiv Sena's Pune city President, Pramod Bhangire said that the party has gained significant ground in terms of organisation and cadre strength.
Pramod Bhangire said, "Today there were some media reports that said Shiv Sena has no claim on any of the seats in Pune city but these reports are false we have a claim on at least three out of eight seats in Pune city. Shiv Sena is specifically eyeing the Hadapsar, Vadgaon Sheri, and Khadakwasla assembly constituencies, Bhangire, who is eying for the Hadapsar constituency himself, has urged Chief Minister Eknath Shinde to consider the party's demand for these three constituencies." Historically, Shiv Sena had a presence in Pune, with two MLAs in 2009 - one in Kothrud and one in Hadapsar - before the party split. The upcoming elections will test Shiv Sena's strength in the city.
Currently in Pune city BJP holds five seats: Parvati (Madhuri Misal), Kothrud (Chandrakant Patil), Shivajinagar (Siddharth Shirole), Pune Cantonment (Sunil Kamble), and Khadakwasla (Bhimarao Tapkir) whereas NCP holds two seats Vadgaon Sheri (Sunil Tingre) and Hadapsar (Chetan Tupe) both MLAs are currently with Ajit Pawar, Congress holds the Kasba seat with Ravindra Dhangekar as MLA.
Earlier on Wednesday morning media reports had claimed that Shiv Sena has no claims of assembly constituency seats in Pune city which the senior Shiv Sena leader and city President Pramod Bhangire later refuted.
