Mira-Bhayander civic polls see lotus bloom

Mumbai: With a comprehensive win in the Mira Bhayander municipal corporation (MBMC) elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) once again proved that it has a stronghold in the urban plateau of Maharashtra.

With a seemingly complete control over the urban voters in the recent elections, the party’s future in state politics looks bright. The BJP won 61 out of 95 seats in the Mira Bhayander municipality whereas its principal opposition party Shiv Sena could win only  22 seats.

While former MLA from the city Pratap Sarnaik was handling the battle for the Sena, local MLA Narendra Mehta was handling the election for BJP. In 2012, BJP was the single largest party with 32 seats, while Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) had 26, Congress 18, Shiv Sena 15 and others had four respectively.

But on Monday, BJP almost doubled its 2012 tally, winning 61 seats. Sena was second with 22 seats. Congress got 10 seats whereas NCP, which had the second highest number of seats in the last election, got decimated and failed to even open its account.

The BJP has been successful in winning urban and semi-urban pockets since 2014. The party won 168 out of 260 civic council seats in the December 2016 elections all over the state. Also, BJP won nine out of 11 municipalities in the March 2017 municipal elections. This included BJP more than doubling its tally in the prestigious Brihanmumbai Municipal Council elections.

After delimitation of Assembly constituencies in Maharashtra, 105 seats out of 288 fall in urban or semi-urban areas. The BJP creating hegemony in the plateau indicates that the party will perform well in such areas in the next Assembly elections.